Lost and Found
by lady-warrioress
Summary: An interstellar bounty hunter comes to cappytown looking for a friend, however King Dedede has other plans when he orders an energy consuming creature from Holy Nightmare . /Animeverse
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Cappytown, a quint little village nestled between a beach covered in soft white sand and a forest of apple trees. To the passerby it could have looked like any other small town on the planet of Popstar, quiet, peaceful, the perfect place to raise a family. However this little village was more than what it seemed, thanks to the activities of the monarch residing in the castle resting on the hill just a short distance away. Fortunately the royal who lived there had not caused excitement in the village for some time now, putting those within the vicinity of that castle at ease.

One of the locals was out that morning, seated beside a tree on a small cliff overlooking the beach, reading a book and enjoy the peace and quiet. This girl looked to be no more than twelve years old. She had blond hair, yellow colored skin, and large green eyes. She wore a pink and green colored pair of clothing and orange shoes. The girl would have probably remained there all day, if not for the fact that something in the sky caught her eye.

"Huh?" she said, looking up from her book to stare at the object, moving slowly through the fluffy white clouds framed against the bright blue sky. "What's that?"

As she continued to watch' the object grew larger and she could make out more details. It seemed to be some kind of starship, roundish and and orange/yellow in color. When it was even closer she notice it seemed to have a green colored windshield. She had never seen such a thing before.

Suddenly the ship gained speed and shot right over her, nearly knocking her over with the large wind gust it stirred up, before it disappeared beyond a clump of trees.

Once things had calmed down the girl jumped to her feet and rushed off in the direction the ship had headed, hoping to find out where it had gone. She followed the thin smoke trail in the sky and dashed into the forest, continuing to follow it the best she could through gaps in the branches.

Eventually she came upon the location where the ship had landed, stopping in her tracks and ducking behind a bush where she then peeked through the leaves to get her first full view of it. From her vantage point she could now see the ship clearly. She discovered the ship was actually quite a bit larger than she'd first expected, it's whole form taking up nearly the entire clearing where it rested.

Most ships when landing on Popstar tended to crash but this one seemed to have touched down harmlessly, doing no damage to the wild life around it. She also noticed it was indeed a yellowish orange color and that the windshield was shaped in such a way that it made the craft look like a helmet of some kind.

"I wonder what kind of creature could be inside there-?" she started to ask herself but was interrupted when a voice called out to her, causing her to nearly jump out of her skin.

"Tiff! Hey, Tiff!"

Gasping, the girl named Tiff turned to look over her shoulder, spotting a boy with slightly darker skin than her own, blue and orange hair covering his eyes rushing toward her. Behind him were two others, blue and pink with large eyes and the pink one sporting a yellow bow, round balls floating in the air after him.

"Tuff, Lololo, Lalala!" she exclaimed then put her hand over the boy's mouth when he came up to her . 'SHHHH!"

The boy named Tuff, who was also her younger brother, to his credit went quiet so she removed her hand from his mouth. "Did you see the space ship in the sky?" he asked her quietly.

Tiff nodded, turning her attention back to the clearing before them. "It's over there," she indicated the clearing.

Tuff and Lololo and Lalala moved to peek around the bushes at the thing. "Wow!" the boy exclaimed when he got a good look at it. "It is a space ship!"

"But where did it come from?" Lololo wanted to know. "and why did it land here?" Lalala finished.

"I don't know," Tiff replied, looking back out at the ship. "But we're about to find out." she once again pointed toward the ship. "Look!"

The other three did so, poking their heads out once more just as the bottom part of the ship opened and a figure exited, walking down a small gang plank before pausing just as they stepped on the grass, giving the children a full view of the pilot.

The figure was tall, maybe even taller than King Dedede and seemed to be wearing some kind of metal space suit that was in the same colors of the ship itself. Tiff noticed the figure's helmet was shaped strangely like the design of the ship, complete with the green visor, she also noticed this visitor didn't seem to hand a right hand, as in it's place was a green colored arm cannon of some kind. The biggest thing they all noticed was that, unlike any of them, this figure had legs!

"Whoa," Tuff said somewhat breathlessly. "What is that thing?"

"I don't know," his sister replied, unable to even guess. "It must be some kind of robot."

The 'robot" as if hearing them, turning it's head in their direction. The children gasped in unison and quickly ducked back behind the bush.

"Do you think it saw us?" Lalala asked.

"I don't know," Tiff replied. "but I hope not."

Tuff looked up just then and his expression changed to one of terror. "Uh, T-Tiff," he said nervously.

"What?" she asked.

Without saying a word, he shakily pointed a finger above her.

"Huh?" she lifted her head to look where he was pointing and froze, her face taking on a similar expression to her brother's. "Eeeeeeee..."

Standing above them was the pilot of the ship, looking down at the four children.

"I uh..." Tiff stammered, trying to come up with something to say, but her brain seemed to have stopped working and she could only babble incoherently.

"Don't vaporize us!" Tuff exclaimed, throwing himself face first onto the ground. "We'll do _anything_ , even take you to our leader, though you probably won't like him so forget I said that!"

The ship's pilot, to the children's surprise began to chuckle, it's voice sounding oddly female behind the helmet. When it spoke the fact it was female became even more obvious. "I'm not going to vaporize you."

"You're not?" Tuff asked, lifting his head to stare at the pilot's helmet.

"Of course not," the pilot said, reaching up and removing her helmet. When she did, long blonde hair tumbled out over her shoulders. "You don't look hostile."

The four kids stared at the hunter's face, taking in the slightly tanned complexion, dark blue eyes that shone in good humor, and blonde hair that framed her beautiful face.

"Wow," Tuff said, smiling goofily. "you're pretty."

"Thank you," the woman said, smiling slightly. "I never hear that kind of compliment very often, especially in my line of work."

"You're line of work?" Tiff asked, getting over her fright, now that she realized that the pilot wasn't going to hurt them. "What exactly do you do?"

"I'm a bounty hunter," the woman replied.

"A bounty hunter?" Tiff asked, glancing over at her brother then back at the woman. The girl knew what bounty hunters did, as she'd read plenty of books about them and from stories her friend Knuckle Joe had told as his profession was very similar. "Does that mean you're here to capture somebody?"

"No," she answered honestly, turning her attention toward the trees as if she were lost in thought. "I'm looking for a friend, I was led to believe he might reside on this planet."

"You're looking for a friend?" The girl questioned, now even more curious.

Ttuff whispered to his sister. "Do you think she means Kirby?"

"Maybe," she whispered back. To the woman she said "If you think that friend of yours is here on Popstar we'd be happy to help you find them."

"Would you?" the bounty hunter asked her, looking hopeful.

"Sure," the girl replied, smiling at her. "By the way, My name is Tiff," she then gestured to the other children. " and this is my brother Tuff and this is Lololo and Lalala."

"Nice to meet you all," the woman said. "I'm Samus, Samus Aran."

* * *

Tiff, Tuff, and the Lola twins weren't the only ones who had seen the ship fly across the sky and land in the forest. The residents of Cappytown had also witnessed this and a large group of them headed off to the forest to investigate. However the cappys were having a hard time figuring out which of their local authority figures should go into the forest and find out where the ship had landed.

"It's the police's job to ensure we are safe from alien invaders," Mayor Blustergas insisted, his attention focused squarely on Chief Bookum, the town's sheriff and only police officer.

"But _you're_ an elected official," Bookum argued, arms folded and a serious expression on his face. "You should be the one to go in and investigate."

"Bookum-"

"Hey, look! Someone's coming!" a child cappy with pigtails exclaimed, pointing into the trees.

As one the cappies turn to the trees, letting out a collective gasp as a group of figures came into view.

"It's an _invasion_!" one of them screamed, which caused massive panic and a stampede back toward Cappytown, leaving only Blustergas and Bookum still standing just outside the treeline.

"Hey, come back!" Bookum shouted after them, clenching a fist angrily. "Or I'll give you all speeding tickets!"

"Um.. Bookum!" the mayor exclaimed, regaining the police officer's attention, by grabbing the back of his jacket and tugging on it roughly.

"What-" he turned and stared in surprise at what he saw. "Oh!"

Tiff, Tuff, Lololo, and Lalala, along with a taller figure stepped out of the forest together. The two head officials of Cappytown stared up at the tall figure, mouths hanging wide open in shock.

"Mayor Blustergas, Chief Bookum?" Tiff asked, regarding the two cappys with confusion, after her group had joined them just outside of the treeline. "What are you guys doing here?"

"We saw the space ship and came to find out where it landed," the mayor explained.

"But it looks like you found it first," Bookum finished, his large black eyes locked on the fifth figure. "Who's this?"

"Oh this?" Tiff looked up at the tall figure standing behind her. "This is Samus Aran, she's come here to find a friend of her's."

"A friend?" Mayor Blustergas asked, curious. "Who might that be?"

"To be honest I am not sure if he's actually here," Samus replied, looking down at the two cappys. "I had asked around and told he might have come to this planet."

"Well who is it?" Bookum repeated the mayor's question. "Maybe we can create a search party."

Before the woman could give them an answer a figure came walking by. A small pink, round ball shaped creature with blue eyes and a big happy smile, carrying a watermelon above him.

"Hey, it's Kirby!" Tuff exclaimed. He put his hands to the sides of his mouth and called out. "Hey Kirby!"

Upon hearing his name being called, the pink puffball named Kirby paused and turned toward those who called to him. "Poyo?"

"Over here Kirby!" Tiff called, waving to him.

Kirby smiled happily when he spotted his friends and, dropping the watermelon, came running over to greet them. When he reached the group, Tiff said. "Samus, I'd like to introduce you to Kirby. He's a star warrior."

Upon hearing that fact, she looked down at the pink puff standing before her. "Oh really?" Samus looked interested, as she turned her attention to the pink puff standing before her. "Is that a fact?"

Kirby met her gaze and smiled, squealing happily. "Poyo!"

'Kirby," Tiff said, addressing the puff ball now. "This is Samus Aran."

"Samus! Samus!" Kirby squealed, happily bouncing in the air.

"Is Kirby the friend you are looking for?" Tuff asked her as Kirby ran circles around the woman.

Samus shook her head in a somewhat dejected manner. "I'm sorry," she replied. "Unfortunately he's not. "

"He isn't?" Tiff asked, surprised. She'd been so sure Kirby had been the friend the bounty hunter had come to see. "Then who is it?"

"Well, he's-" But her answer was cut off by Kirby jumping up and taking her hand and attention. "Oh! What is this?"

"I think KIrby wants to say hello too," Tiff replied, watching her friend happily tugging on the bounty hunter's hand. "and I think he wants you to come with him."

Samus had to lean over slightly so Kirby's feet could touch the ground. He started to pull her along with him, making cheerful noises. "Where is he taking me?"

The mayor and Bookum seemed to understand right away what Kirby was up to. "I think he wants to show you around Cappytown," the mayor told her.

"Cappytown?"

"Yes," Tiff explained. "It's where the cappys live. It's not too far from here and you might have seen it from inside your ship before you landed." she cocked her head slightly. "Er-You don't mind taking a break from finding your friend to let Kirby give you a tour, do you?"

"I guess not," she said with a slight sigh. "I've been looking for him for years, a few more hours won't make any difference..."

* * *

Kirby, and the others entered Cappytown and instantly became the center of attention once the residents caught sight of the tall stranger with them. It didn't take long for a crowd to get over their previous panic and gather around them and for introductions to be made. After formalities were exchanged, Samus answered questions thrown her way, like who she was, what she was and where she came from.

"I'm a bounty hunter," she explained to the cappys after she managed to get an opening through the round of questioning. "I am a human and I grew up on a planet called Zebes." she smiled a bit sadly at the memory of her home.

The cappy children along with quite a few of the adults were very curious about Samus' armor which was very odd looking. "Where did you get that fancy armor?" Iro, one of the cappy children who wore a small hat and a blue and white striped shirt, and Tuff's friend asked her. "It looks to fancy to have been made anywhere on Popstar."

"I got this from Zebes," she explained. "It was created by a race of humanoid birds called the Chozo." that sad look crossed her face again. "They were a proud warrior race and very advanced, creating many types of technology, including this very power suit."

"Wow!"

"So where are they now?" Iro questioned.

Samus face fell and she said in a somewhat evasive tone. "They're in a safe place." she looked around herself. "You have a very lovely town," she said, changing the subject.

Tiff noticed Samus didn't seem too comfortable talking about the planet she grew up on or the creatures who raised her and she had to wonder why. She could only guess something must have happened to those things and the memory was painful. The Dreamland girl was just glad nobody was asking her too much about that, as the cappys seemed to be more interested in her profession and also showing her around the town.

"Come see my restaurant," Cheff Kowasaki encouraged the bounty hunter, gesturing across the street to the building. "It's got the finest cuisine on Popstar."

"If she tries his food she'll never want to come back," Tuff whispered to his sister.

"I don't know," she answered. "She might actually like his food."

"Then her stomach must be made of the same metal as her power suit."

As Samus began to cross the street with Kowasaki toward the building he called his restaurant, there was a commotion down the street from the group and their guest that was growing louder very quickly.

"Look out, Miss Aran!" Tiff shouted at her as the girl spotted King Dedede's limo roaring towards her.

Too late! Samus turned her head, just as the car loomed before her and then came to a screeching halt just in front of her. If the driver hadn't hit the breaks when they had the large vehicle might have hit her.

"Hey!" the driver, a large purple snail wearing a green shell, shouted at her. "Move out of the road, you lunatic! Don't you understand the basic rules of crossing the street?!"

Tne female bounty hunter did not give any kind of response to his question, she simply stood there like a statue, blue eyes locked on the snail. It almost looked like she was taking a moment to process what had just happened.

"Hey, are you _deaf_?!' A large blue penguin-like creature wearing a crown and a red robe with gold trim, shouted at her. "Move outta here, before-" he paused noticing that the person he was speaking to was not anybody he'd even seen before. "Waita minute, who are _you_ and _where_ did you come from?!"

When she said nothing the snail snapped. "You, answer him, you're talking to a king, learn some respect!"

But Samus still made remark, causing the cappy's around her to look at her with worried expressions, as they feared how Dedede was going to respond to her stoney silence. Judging by the look on his face he wasn't too happy about it.

"What is she doing?" Tuff asked of his sister.

"I don't know," she replied, watching the bounty hunter nervously. "It looks like she's just staring at him."

"Whatever it is Dedede looks awful mad."

"Yeah..."

"Hey, I'm dressin' you here!" Dedede bellowed, placing his hands on the car's dashboard and leaning forward, so he could get a better look at her. A vein popped out on his forehead and it looked like it was about to burst. "You gonna answer me or just stand there like a stone statue until I have ya run over?!"

At this proclamation Samus' expression changed to a cold glare which made the snail begin to feel nervous. "Umm, sire," he whispered, taking hold on his king's arm. "I don't think you should-"

Suddenly Samus changed her stance, stepping back slightly and aiming her arm cannon at the car, which caused every single cappy to stare in shock at what she was doing.

Dedede began to demand, "Hey, what do you think you're-" but before he could finish his sentence, his snail friend panicked, backing up the car nearly knocking the fat king out of it and with the screech of tires coming spun the vehicle around and burned rubber to get away from her.

"Uh... what just happened?" Tiff asked after a moment of shocked silence.

Samus straightened her stance and lowered her arm canon, shaking her head and sighing with annoyance at the whole thing. She noticed the cappys were all staring at her and her face went slightly red. "I'm sorry," she apologized, reaching up to rub the back of her head in embarrassment. "That really wasn't an appropriate way for me to act toward your king."

"Don't worry about it," Tiff told her. "King Dedede kind of had to coming anyway." she quickly thought of a way to get the hunter's mind off of it. "Why don't we all go into Kowasaki's restaurant and have some lunch?"

As the group continued their trek toward the chef's place Tuff caught up with his sister and whispered. "I don't think you should have told her not to worry about it. King Dedede's not going to be very happy about this."

"I know, Tuff," his sister replied. "but hopefully she'll find her friend and leave before he decides to try anything." That was what she said out loud but as the group finished crossing the street, the girl looked up the hill toward Dedede's castle, she got the worst feeling Samus Aran was going to regret what she'd done much more than she already did.

 _I just hope he doesn't decide to order a monster in retaliation..._

 _a/n_

 _This story was inspired by a level in Kirby's Dreamland 3 where Samus Aran tasks Kirby with freezing some metroids. Ruminating over this for awhile finally gave me the idea for this. I am doing it in the anime universe for the simple reason that Dedede has the monster delivery system in the anime and it's kind of a requirement for this. Also for names and locations and stuff I am using some things from the dub and other things from the sub, like Lololo and Lalala's names, since they're the canon ones in the games._


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Tiff and the cappys weren't the only ones who had seen the bounty hunter's ship land in the forest, up at the castle a figure clad in a silver mask, dark armor and a royal blue cape had also been watching the ship from his vantage point on the balcony of one of the castle's towers where he had his living quarters. From the castle he couldn't get a very good look at the ship, though he was certain he could make out what looked like a orangish yellow body and a slim green windshield. With so little to go on he couldn't be sure of what he was seeing, but for some reason what he could make out gave him an unpleasant feeling, as if something bad was about to happen. Or maybe, due to the outcomes of strange ships landing in Dreamland in the past, he was just being paranoid.

While he was considering this he became aware of the sound of a motor running and looked down toward the road, spotting King Dedede's limo roaring toward the castle. He watched the draw bridge lower and then the car drive into the the courtyard. Once it was there he saw the vehicle stop and then the king and his snail chauffeur hop out.

"Escargoon! Why did you pull outta there like that!?" Dedede was angrily demanding of the snail. "I nevea told ya to peel out like a weak old banana!"

"With all due respect, your highness," the snail named Escargoon replied, flinching slightly as if he expected the king to hit him. "With her aiming that weapon of her's at it us looked like she wanted to sending us blasting off like a rocket."

"You're too paranoid!" Dreamland's ruler roared into his face. "She was jus' bluffing!"

"She sure didn't look like she was bluffing," the king companion remarked, obviously the smarter of the two. "Given your reputation and all she probably would have fired." he made a slightly smug face, closing his eyes and lifting his arms. "I mean it's not like you-"

His statement was cut off by Dedede smashing him flat into the ground with a large wooden mallet the monarch seemed to have pulled out of nowhere. "Ah shuddup!" he commanded, no longer willing to put up with the snail's snarky attitude. 'Who asked ya anyway?"

The figure watched Dedede storm off into the castle, quickly followed by his long suffering snail companion who was now wielding the mallet and looking very ticked off. He had to wonder who the two had been talking about. Was it the pilot of the space ship he'd seen landing only moments ago?

"Sir Meta Knight," a voice spoke up behind him.

The armored figure, upon hearing his name, turned to face the speaker, a slightly taller figure than himself clad into blue armor.

"Yes?" Meta Knight spoke, his voice a flat baritone.

"Would you like Blade and I to go down and see if we can find out what was in that ship that landed?" the figure in blue armor asked of him. "It might be what the king and Escargoon were talking about just now."

Meta Knight considered the request, wondering why it brought back that bad feeling from before. For all he knew the person in that ship had just been Sirica, the daughter of a female star warrior he'd fallen in love with before she'd sacrificed herself, coming by to pay Tiff and the cappys a visit. If it was her...

He nodded to the figure in blue armor. "If you wish, Sword Knight" he told him. "Be as quick as you can, find out all you are able to and then come back here quickly and give me a report."

"Yes, Sir Meta Knight," Sword Knight nodded his head then rushed off to find his companion Blade.

Once the knight had taken his leave Meta Knight turned his attention back to the balcony and looked back toward the forest.

 _I do hope it is not who I fear it is..._

* * *

Turned out Samus actually _did_ enjoy Kawasaki's cooking. This fact proved to not only cause major shock to Tiff and the cappys but it made the chef feel extremely touched and happy that Kirby hadn't been the only one to enjoy anything he'd made. When she complimented him on his cooking he nearly melted into a pile of joyful tears.

"How can she eat that stuff?" Tuff asked, unable to wrap his head around the whole thing.

Samus had heard him. "Compared to some of the things I've eaten this food is not that bad," she told him. "You should give him more credit, at least he's making an effort."

"Oh..." he said nothing more. The boy had never thought about that.

Kirby squealed happily as Samus handed him a bowel of soup. "Here, you can have this, I'm full now." he gratefully took the bowel from her and literally inhaled it.

A little while later after Kirby had finished up the rest of the bounty hunter's lunch, she and the children left the restaurant. By then the streets, which had been crowded with curious cappys only minutes earlier, had emptied out. This was thanks to Chief Bookum making the crowds break up and go back to their lives. That didn't keep the cappy's from watching her from a distance though, as she and her children companions walked through the streets.

"You have a nice little town here," she told them, as she looked at all the happy residents. "It's so quiet and peaceful here."

"Yeah it is," Tiff agreed. "It's one of the best places to live, most of the time."

The hunter looked down at her curiously. " _Most_ of the time?"

Tiff opened her mouth to explain but her words were cut off by the sound of a loud, scratchy, obnoxious voice calling out. "Kirby! Hey kirby!"

She turned her head toward the direction the voice had come from just in time to see a small green bird come flying over toward her and the children and come to a stop in front of Kirby where it then hovered and started shouting abuse at the little pink star warrior.

"Where have you been?" the bird shouted in bad temper. "You were supposed to bring me my lunch hours ago, junior! What is taking you so long?" he started poking Kirby on the head with his beak, making the little puff squeal in protest. "Why are you so lazy? Can't you do _anything_ right-"

That's when the bird suddenly noticed Samus. "Ah!" he now flew in her face, screeching "Who is this broad? Is this why you're taking so long, junior?" he now addressed her. "Hey there, missy. You have got _some nerve_ holding this boy up like that. Don't you have any manners-"

The rest of his lecture was cut off by Samus blasting the little bird clear across Dreamland with a low powered charge from her arm canon. The children stared at her in shock, mouths hanging open. She let her arm drop and remarked. "That has got to be the most obnoxious and rude bird I have ever met, and I was raised by them!" when she noticed the children staring she said. "Don't worry. I didn't hurt him, much. He'll be back to squawk another day."

"Wow," Tuff remarked. "she took out Tokori without a second thought, not that he didn't deserve it..."

Samus heard him and looked down at the boy. "Was he a friend of yours?"

"Not really," he admitted as Tiff made a face. "He just kind of lives around here."

"He took Kirby's house!" Lalala spoke up.

"And makes him sleep in his nest and clean up the house like a slave," Lololo added.

"He does that, to a _baby_?!" Samus exclaimed, indignant. "Then I _don't_ feel bad for shooting him." she rested her hand on her arm canon, looking like she was about to lose her temper. "Maybe I _should_ have fried him..."

Tiff decided it was time to change the subject. Much as she had to agree that Tokori deserved to be punished for how he treated Kirby she wasn't going to support killing him. "Would you like a tour of the castle?" she asked her.

"Castle?" the hunter asked, then remembered the castle she'd seen when she'd landed. "You mean the one on the hill? Where your king lives?" She frowned, not sure she'd enjoy that very much, _especially_ if she ran into that loud mouthed blue penguin again. "Are you sure that would be a good idea after what I just did to him?"

Tiff wasn't sure how to answer that so she said. "If we keep you out of sight you should be okay," she told her. "We live there too so it's not like you're barging in." she started up the road toward the castle, gesturing for the bounty hunter to follow her. "Come on, we'll show you around."

Samus was about to deny the request but then she realized that maybe she'd be able to find her friend in that castle. It looked pretty big and probably took a lot of people to maintain it. He might just be there, maybe have even offered his services to the king she'd met earlier, though she couldn't figure out _why_ he'd subject himself to that, given how rotten the "king" of Dreamland was.

She said. "Very well then, please escort me to the castle."

* * *

Sword and Blade didn't have a lot of trouble finding Samus Aran's ship, since it hadn't been landed very far into the woods and it's colors stood out from the landscape around it. Once they discovered it's location the duo paused a moment to look it over, a sense of awe washing over them at the sight of it.

With its colors and shape and just other worldly design it took the two a moment to fully comprehend what they were seeing. As one, they stepped closer to it, being extremely cautious, as if they expected the machine to attack them. However it did no such thing, being made of metal and having no sentience, it merely sat there, silent, lifeless, and simply a piece of Chozo technology.

"Blade, you ever seen anything like it?" Sword asked his companion.

Blade, not much for words, shook his head, making no comment. What did his friend expect him to say? They hadn't lived apart for as long as he could remember so whatever Sword saw he did too. He felt the same way his companion did, though he was more than a little curious about the ship and whoever had occupied it.

"...You think they're still around?" he finally asked. "Think they're inside of there?"

"There's only one way to find out," Sword responded. "Come on, let's see if we can get closer."

Moving forward proved that nobody was inside of the ship. If they had been the two were certain they would have caught some kind of movement through the visor like windshield but nothing, unless the occupant was simply holding still and watching them, waiting for the duo to make their next move.

There didn't seem to be any way in, not that they could see anyway. Neither swordsman had any desire to try breaking in. That would be going too far. What right did they have to even think about pulling such a stunt anyway?

Sword stood there a moment, trying to figure out their next course of action. They obviously couldn't get inside the ship and they were given no reason to make the effort. He turned back to Blade.

"Maybe we should head back to the castle now and give Sir Meta Knight our report," he suggested.

His friend nodded, realizing it was the only thing they could do currently. "...Let's head back."

* * *

Tiff could tell Samus was impressed by the castle by the way she paused for a moment once they had reached the grounds and took a moment to let everything sink in. She noticed her attention lingered for a moment on the playground and then on the large fountain in the middle of the court yard. Then she noticed her eyes move upward and scan the walls and balconies of the towers, as if she were looking for someone or something.

 _She's trying to find her friend,_ the girl realized.

"Come on," she said aloud. "Let's head inside. We'll be able to search better from the inside."

The hunter looked down at her and nodded.

Tiff and the others led the woman inside of the castle, showing her around the place, pointing out certain rooms and answering questions when she had them. As they walked along the girl noticed quiet a few times that their bounty hunter friend would pause and take a moment to look around to see if she caught sight of her friend.

The girl finally said to her. "I don't want to come off as rude or anything, but could you maybe describe what your friend looks like? It would make things a bit easier for us."

Samus paused a took a moment to think. "He might have changed since I last saw him," she replied. "It's been quite some time since I've seen him."

"I'm sure he hasn't changed too much," Tiff responded.

The hunter let that sink in a moment then said. "Well he's kind of short," she began. "But short to me probably isn't short to any of you." she looked down at them all. "I am quite a bit taller than all of you after all. "

Tuff remarked. "You're almost as tall as Whispy Woods."

She didn't know who that was but she'd take his word for it. "Anyway, hes kind of short and wears armor." she continued her description. "He also owns a sword that's a bit odd. It's not shaped like most swords, oh and he wears a cape." she added.

Tiff considered the description a moment then glanced at the other children as realization washed over her. By the looks on the others faces, save for Kirby who seemed oblivious, they all came upon the same conclusion as well.

"Umm," the girl said after a moment. "the name of your friend... it wouldn't be Meta Knight, would it?"

By the look on the hunter's face when she said the name of the former star warrior, the answer was a big resounding yes.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

"So he _is_ here!" Samus exclaimed, when the children nodded in confirmation.

"How do you know Sir Meta Knight?" Tuff asked her, curious.

"It's kind of complicated," the bounty hunter replied, looking a unsure about giving that information to her young friends. "During his time as a star warrior he and a few others had aided me in one of my missions. That's how I met him." she got a bit of a far away look on her face as she continued. "Nightmare's forces weren't the _only_ creatures causing a disturbance at the time. There were other beings with similar motives making themselves known in some not so pleasant ways as well. "

"There were?" Lololo asked.

Samus looked away, her gaze centering on nothing. "They were called space pirates."

"Space pirates?!" Tuff exclaimed. He was suddenly much more interested in her story now."You mean like finding buried treasure and walking the plank but in space?"

The hunter shook her head. "No, they're far worse than that," she told him. "They're the kind of pirates that will massacre an entire space colony and leave a three year old girl an orphan." She clenched her hand into a tight fist as she said this making it so tight her entire hand shook in suppressed anger. "The star warriors, along with Meta Knight offered to help me deal with a few of them."

"So what happened?" Tiff wanted to know.

Samus paused for a moment before she replied. "It didn't go down like it was supposed to."

It hadn't?

The children waited for her to elaborate but she changed the subject. "Can you take me to where he is?" she asked them, returning her focus to why she'd come to the planet in the first place. "Does he live somewhere in the castle? I would really like to see him, since that's the reason I came here."

"Okay," Tiff agreed, a little thrown off that Samus wasn't going to elaborate on her story, but choosing to believe it was probably painful and she didn't want to relive the memory again. "We can take you to him. " the girl started to head down the hall. "His quarters are this way, come on."

* * *

King Dedede stomped into the throne room of his castle, still in a foul mood over his encounter with the human bounty hunter earlier that afternoon. Escargoon hadn't joined him because he'd decided it wasn't worth arguing over and had gone off to his own chambers to read. The king on the other hand wasn't about to get over it any time soon and just got more and more angry the longer he thought about it.

How dare that alien come to his kingdom and threaten him like that!? Who did she think she was?! He was the _king_! She needed to learn some respect!

With that in mind the birdlike monarch rushed to his throne where he hopped into the seat and hit a button on the right armrest that brought down some kind of futuristic delivery system and a large television that blinked on instantly. On the screen appeared a human like face with dark hair and a light skinned wearing a pair of classy shades that completely hid his eyes. He grinned down at the king with a winning smile.

"Hey there, triple D, what can I do for you today?" he greeted him.

"Stuff the nonsense," Dedede cut him off before he could go through his usual schtick. "I need a monster that will teach somebody a lesson."

"A lesson?" the man on the screen asked, looking somewhat confused by his statement. The king was known for ordering monsters for some rather petty reasons but this was pushing it, "What did you have in mind?"

"Something that will firmly cement in that smart aleck woman's mind that I am the king around here."

"Smart aleck woman eh?" The salesman remarked. "What exactly did she look like?"

"Some tall, blond female in a suit of armor," Dedede did his best to describe her further. "She tried ta procrastinate me with this cannon attached to her right arm."

"A cannon on her arm?" The salesman let that sink in a moment, rubbing is chin thoughtfully, before he smiled in a very odd way. "I think I have just the thing to deal with this armored lady."

The delivery system device powered up and something was sent through in a shower of static and sparks. When everything had settled down the king saw a small clear glass canister sitting in the middle of the device with something inside. Getting out of his chair he crossed over to it for a closer look. The thing inside the canister looked like a transparent creature with a strange "brain" shaped like three red balls, below it at the bottom of the transparent thing's body were four fang like protrusions. The creature let out a funny sounding squeak.

"What is this thing here?" Dedede demanded, rather unsettled by the thing's appearance. What in Popstar had that man sent him?!

The salesman explained. "This creature is something we like to refer to as a metroid."

"A metroid?" the king leaned toward the canister for a closer look. "It don't look that iminitating ta me."

The man on the screen spoke up. "Don't let that thing's look fool you, triple D. It might look like a floating jellyfish but it has a rather nasty ability."

"Oh?"

"These beings were created by a race of bird-like creatures known as the Chozo," he began his explanation. "their primary functions were to absorb energy from any living thing it decides to latch its fangs on to."

"Oh really now?" Dedede picked up the canister and further scrutinized the metroid inside of it. "with these fangs here?"

"Yup,"the man replied. "it'll hang on tightly until it's victim is nothing but a lifeless husk."

"Hmm..." Dedede's face lit up with a wicked smile. "I think I know just the person to try this out on."

Before the salesman could do any further explaining about the metroid the king rushed out of the throne room, the canister gripped firmly in his arms.

"He should have let me finished telling him about it if he intends to set that thing loose," the salesman said to himself. He sighed and put up his hands in a helpless gesture. "Oh well, I guess he'll just have to find out for himself."

The screen blinked out.

* * *

Meta Knight had been watching the children and Samus when they'd entered the castle courtyard. When he'd caught sight of the female bounty hunter the reason for his unnerved feeling earlier finally got its answer.

 _I do not believe it,_ he thought as he watched her follow the children into the castle. _she's here..._

While he was trying to comprehend this Sword and Blade returned and entered his chambers. Sword's voice took his thoughts briefly away from the hunter as he turned to face the duo.

As they gave their report it turned out to be information that wasn't very useful now that he knew who had arrived in the ship. He didn't know her true purpose for being there yet but he was pretty certain the woman he'd seen with the children only moments prior was there because she wanted to see him.

"I know who was in the ship," he told the other two knights once they had finished .

"You do?" Sword asked, startled by this revelation. "Who?"

He turned away, wrapping himself up in his cape as he responded. "Somebody I believed I would never see again."

"Oh?" the two looked at each other then back at him. Meta Knight could tell they were waiting for him to explain further on what he had said, but he hesitated, unsure if he wanted to share that information with them. He'd known the female bounty hunter long before he'd ever met his two companions and they might not be able to understand his relationship with her or the outcome of it.

"It is not important," he finally said after a moment of silence.

"Well, are you going to say hello to them then?" Sword wanted to know.

"...No."

The two knights looked at each other, confused by his answer. No? But if that person was his friend wouldn't he be happy to go see them? Why wasn't he going to talk to them? Had something happened between the two? What if that person wasn't a friend at all? What if it really was an enemy and that was why he didn't want to go see them?

Considering what had happened the last two times a person came to the planet looking for Meta Knight Sword and Blade really couldn't blame him for wanting to stay as far away from them as possible.

"Is it an enemy?" Sword pressed.

"... Should we keep an eye on this person?" Blade questioned.

"There is no need for that," the retired Star Warrior told them. "This person is not a threat, just a..." he paused as he looked for the right words. "Just somebody I do not wish to talk to."

Before either of them could question him further he'd jumped onto the balcony and then over the side.

 _Now is just not a good time for this,_ he thought as he landed on the castle grounds. He rushed away from the castle without a look back. _No time will ever be..._

* * *

Tiff, Tuff, Kirby, and the Lola twins led Samus to the part of the castle where Meta Knight had his chambers. Once they arrived Tiff raised her hand to knock on the door, turning to look at the bounty hunter as they waited for the star warrior to answer his door. A few moments later Blade opened the door. He eyed the children and then the tall figure in the red and yellow colored power suit without a single word.

"Hi Blade," Tuff finally said feeling a little awkward at his silence. "Is Sir Meta Knight home?"

"..He just left," Blade responded after a moment's hesitation.

"He did?" Tiff asked, her face expression somewhat confused. "Do you know where he went?"

Blade shook his head. "... Didn't say a single word where he was going." he answered her. "...went off by himself."

"Oh..." Tiff looked up at Samus whose face fell in disappointed. "I see.. Do you know when he'll be back?"

Once more Blade shook his head.

The girl sighed. "I'm sorry, Miss Aran," Tiff said, turning fully to Samus now. "It looks like you're going to have to wait a little longer to speak with Sir Meta Knight."

The woman's face fell further and she sighed. "I should have known," she muttered.

Before the kids could ask her what she meant by that, the woman had turned and retraced her steps down the hall.

"Who was that?" Blade asked the children after the hunter was out of earshot.

"Her name is Samus Aran," Tiff explained, turning her attention back to the knight at the door. "she came here to see Meta Knight. "

"Why?" he inquired, though his attention was still somewhat directed in the direction the bounty hunter had gone off in.

"Because she told us he's a friend of her's," the girl finished her explanation. "she was really looking forward to seeing him again."

* * *

"So what did Tiff want to speak to Sir Meta Knight about?" Sword asked Blade once the children had left.

His companion closed the door and faced him, relaying the entire conversion to the blue armored knight. As he did so Sword frowned under his helmet, trying to make sense of what he'd just learned. The woman, this Samus Aran, believed Meta Knight was a friend of her but from the way the star warrior had acted and described her to them it seemed to be just the opposite.

 _I wonder why Meta Knight said what he did?_ he thought. _Especially since that bounty hunter believes they had some kind of relationship. Hmm..._

* * *

Dedede, metroid capsule in hand, had headed to the chambers of Escargoon who'd left him earlier. He wanted to test out the truth of the Holy Nightmare salesman's claims and he'd chosen the snail scientist has the perfect test subject.

Being as quiet as possible he slowly pushed the door open to the snail's chambers and poked his head inside to see if he was inside. Once he'd looked inside he was relieved to see that Escargoon was indeed in his room. he was seated over at his desk, reading a book and minding his own business.

Satisfied the king slowly shut the door without making a sound and held up the canister housing the metroid in front of him. snickering he unscrewed the top and then reopened the door to Escargoon's room to let the creature out. It held still for a moment then slowly slipped out of the top of the canister and with a faint squeak it entered the snail's room.

Escargoon, his attention completely immersed in his research, didn't notice the flying alien creature until he heard it let out a loud squeak. He then looked up and nearly jumped out of his skin at the sight of it. But since it didn't seem to bear him any ill will he got over it quickly, eyeing it curiously as it hovered harmlessly around him.

"Hello, what are you supposed to be?"

The snail raised his hand and reached out to poke the metroid with his finger. As he did so the thing suddenly turned hostile and screeched at him, opening the mouth on the lower part of its body and flying in for the kill.

Panicking at the creature's sudden mood shift Escargoon screamed and swung at the thing with his book, hitting the floating alien hard. It was knocked back but recovered quickly and flew at him again, hissing in anger.

"No!" he cried out, running from the thing as fast as his sluggish body could carry him. "Get away from me!"

He grabbed up his chair and flung it at the metroid, hitting it square across the front of it's soft jell-like body. It bobbed back and forth for a moment then seemed to lose all of it's courage. It turned from him and, screeching loudly, flew toward the window, breaking the glass as if made it's escape.

Having his rather cruel joke ruined, Dedede barged into the snail's bedroom and bellowed. "What did you do that for?!"

Escargoon's head swiveled around to stare wide eyed at his king. " _What?!"_ he exclaimed.

"Why'd ya let it get away!?" the king cried out, looking ready to hit the poor snail with his mallet. "I spent a lot of moneh on that there metronome and ya let it escape!"

" _You_ bought that thing?!" the snail's face held a blank expression for a few seconds before he exploded. "It tried to _kill_ me! What possessed you to pull such a stunt like that? Have you _completely_ lost your mind?!"

"Aww shuddup," Dedede grumbled, looking toward the window. "It didn't hurt ya."

"Why did you buy that thing in the first place?!"

"I was gonna use it to teach that smart aleck woman to not disrespect the king." he frowned, still looking out the window. "But now it's gotten away." he grabbed the snail by the eyestalk. "and you're gonna help me find it!"

Before Escargoon could protest, Dedede dragged the unfortunate snail out of the room, slamming the door behind them.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Samus had gone out onto the castle grounds, pausing the moment she'd stepped out into the sun lit courtyard. She stepped over to the bench by the fountain in the center of it and sat down, sighing and shaking her head.

 _So, this is how it's going to be,_ she thought, _he's going to avoid me. Nothing is going to get resolved if he doesn't talk to me. Does he honestly believe this is going to change what had happened?_

The bounty hunter looked up toward where she thought the tower that housed Meta Knight's chambers was. Of course she didn't see him there, as the green knight with the red hair, had told her he'd left. Still she stared up at it, wondering what she could do to convince them to allow her to see him.

 _There_ must _be a way, I am not leaving until I get the chance to talk to him. He can't avoid me forever. One way or another I_ will _speak with him!_

She got up from the bench heading toward the drawbridge of the castle. If Meta Knight had left the castle she was just going to have to find him. She didn't care if he didn't want to see her, she was going to talk to him even if she had hog tie and sit on him to do it.

 _I'm not going to let you run away from me, not this time._

* * *

Tiff and the others hadn't hung around Meta Knight's chambers after Blade had finished talking to them and shut the door. The children had retraced their steps in hopes of finding the bounty hunter again. Tiff was worried that she would leave Dreamland before she got a chance to speak with Meta Knight just because he'd been out at the moment.

"Where do you think she headed off to?" Tuff asked his sister.

"I don't know," she answered. "I hope she isn't leaving though. I mean, she could just wait for Meta Knight to come back." she frowned, looking thoughtful. "Though it is kind of weird that he wasn't there. Meta Knight usually stays close to the castle most of the time."

"Well maybe he had something he had to do, Tiff?" Tuff suggested. "It gets boring being in the castle all the time when there really isn't much to do here. For an adult like him it's got to be even more boring."

"Yeah..."

"Or he just went shopping," Lalala put in.

"Yeah, even star warriors have to go grocery shopping," Lololo added.

Tiff didn't make any remark about that instead getting back to the subject at hand. "Come on, let's see if we can find Samus before she leaves Dreamland."

* * *

Samus really hadn't gotten very far from the castle before the children found her. As she'd stepped back onto the road leading to the structure she'd slowed her pace, taking some time to simply have a look around at the planet's scenery and enjoy it's unmolested beauty. She stood still for a moment, wishing all planets could be as peaceful as Popstar.

No wonder Meta knight had come there. Even if the king was a infantile jerk the rest of the place more than made up for that. She was certain he didn't just spend all of his time being ordered around by Dedede.

"Miss Aran!"

A voice calling her name brought her out of her thoughts.

Turning back toward the castle she caught sight of Tiff and the other children rushing toward her. She stopped completely, allowing the youngsters to catch up with her.

"What is it?" she asked once they were standing before her.

"You don't have to leave," Tiff said to her. "I'm sure he'll come back, you just have to be patient."

"I'm not leaving," she told the girl, looking surprised and a little confused that she would think that.

"You're not?"

"No," she replied. "I was just going to go looking for him. If he's not in the castle he has to be somewhere else, you know? I figured he might have gone to the town or somewhere."

"Oh..." Tiff looked somewhat embarrassed. "Sorry, I thought you were going to leave."

Samus shook her head. "No, I'm not leaving," she assured her. "I have no intention of leaving until I actually manage to talk to him."

"You must have something very important to say to him, don't you?" Tuff inquired.

"...Something like that."

"So you weren't leaving," Tiff said. "You want us to help you find him?"

Samus hesitated for a moment. "Are you sure you want to help me?" she asked. "Don't you have something else you need to be doing?"

"No, not really," the girl admitted. "Even if we did I think this is much more important... you don't mind, do you?"

The bounty hunter shook her head. "No, I don't mind, in fact I would appreciate it." She looked around once more, taking in the scenery. "It will give me an excuse to take a tour around this beautiful planet."

"Dreamland _is_ a beautiful place," Tiff agreed, smiling at the compliment the hunter had given her home. "Come on, we'll show you around."

"Lead the way."

* * *

Meta Knight had returned to the castle. After he'd left is companions in such a dramatic fashion he'd gone off to Kabu Canyon where the large sentient stone resided. While he was there he and Kabu had conversed about the recent turn of events.

"I did not expect her to ever find me," he'd admitted to Kabu. "Not after the way I had left her."

"May I ask as to why you wish to not see her?" the big rock asked in his booming voice.

"It is... complicated," the veteran star warrior admitted. "We did not exactly leave each other on understanding terms."

"Do you not mean _you_ did not leave on understanding terms?"

"... you could say that," he answered honestly. Only he wasn't going to tell Kabu what had happened. He wasn't sure the ancient totem would understand his reasoning if he did. "It was just.. better that way."

Kabu to his credit did not question him on it. He must have realized the star warrior wasn't comfortable giving out that information. So he'd simply tried to consol him the best he could, though by the time Meta Knight left him he wasn't feeling any better about it.

He knew he would eventually have to talk to her and, knowing Samus as well as he did, she wouldn't leave until she got that chance. Even still, he would be the one to decide just when that conversation would take place and where, not her.

"Why did you leave the castle the way you did, Sir Meta Knight?" Sword's question was the very first thing the star warrior heard when he returned to his chambers.

He paused in the doorway then turned to face the younger swordsman. He was somewhat blocking his superior's path into the room, an air of intense curiosity surrounding him.

"It is not important," Meta Knight answered him. "Do not worry about it."

Sword wasn't going to let him get away that easily. "Were you avoiding that bounty hunter?" he asked him. "she and Tiff and the others came by earlier looking for you. They said her name is Samus Aran and she claimed to be a friend of yours."

The star warrior said nothing.

Sword cocked his head. "Is that true, sir?" he asked him. " _Are_ you her friend."

Meta Knight said nothing, he slipped past Sword and into the room before giving a short answer. "I was her friend... once."

"What does that mean?" the younger knight asked him. "Did something happen?"

"You could say that?."

"... did you two have a relationship of some kind?" he blurted out.

Meta Knight's eyes flashed an odd color, though it happened so quickly couldn't figure out which one, before he turned away from him and stepped out of the room, leaving the younger knight standing there with more questions than answers.

"Did he tell you?" Blade voices spoke up behind him.

Sword turned to face his fried. "No," he replied. "He just did his best to avoid the subject."

"..must be something bad then..." Blade concluded.

The other knight wasn't sure he agreed with that assessment. Something told him whatever it was it was something Meta Knight wasn't comfortable having out in the open. That didn't mean it was a bad thing, but who knew? Whatever it was he was doing his best to be secretive about it.

 _But why?_

* * *

Finding the metroid proved to be way harder than King Dedede though it would be. He had Escargoon drive him all over Dreamland in search of the floating jellyfish alien. The snail really wasn't looking forward to see it again, after that cruel prank his king tried to pull on him.

From the fat ruler's description of it he'd gotten from the Nightmare Salesman Escargoon realized that the thing really _could_ have killed him if it had had a chance to latch onto him. If it wasn't for the fact Dedede had that mallet with him the snail would have told him to look for that monster himself. Who wanted to help out somebody who'd nearly gotten someone killed anyway?

Did Dedede really think that little of him that he would sacrifice his life just to satisfy his childish curiosity? Given what had led up to their current predicament he knew the answer to that once and he didn't like it one bit.

"And how do you plan on catching it once we find it?" he asked Dedede as they drove through Cappytown and toward the thick forest known as Whispy Woods.

"Oh, ya don't need to be worrying your little head about that, none," his king replied with a grin. "I got a plan."

Meaning he would use the snail as bait. He should have known. Just wonderful.

"Sire, are you even sure that thing would come this far anyway?" he had to ask, hoping he could convince him to change his mind and look somewhere that was more heavily populated. "especially with all the cappys it could have had lunch on in the town."

Dedede seemed to not have heard him. "Let's go," he told him, jumping out of the car. "It's here, I can feel it in mah bones."

'Surprised you can even feel your bones under all that fat," Escargoon grumbled as he followed the Dreamland monarch out of the car.

"What did you say?!" the blue monarch demanded, looking over his shoulder at him.

"Uh, nothing sire," Escargoon said, putting up his hands nervously. "You must have been hearing things."

The king didn't make any kind of comment on that instead turning away and walking further into the trees. "Come on, stop laggin' behind."

The snail followed unhappily after him, wishing he was somewhere else but there. It didn't help that Whispy Woods was looking more dark and foreboding than usual, is if it were hiding some kind of sinister secret in the shadows of its many apple trees. He shuddered, trying not to imagine what kind of nasties could be watching them right now.

It wasn't too long after the two entered the forest that Escargoon noticed something. He grabbed the back of Dedede's robe and tugged on it, making him stop and look back at him with an annoyed expression.

"Look, sire!" he exclaimed, pointing further into the trees. "Over there."

"Huh?" Dedede frowned then moved forward once he'd spotted what the snail had pointed at. "What do we have here now?"

Escargoon watched him head into the trees, not about to follow after him if it was some kind of monster. "What do you see?" he called to him.

Dedede paused, taking a moment to stare at what he'd found. It was brown and brittle looking. Leaning forward his eyes widened when he realized what he was staring at was the lifeless husk of some kind of wild animal. He stepped back, gritting his teeth, completely freaked out.

Escargoon was watching him, noticing that the king had backed up a step. He wondered what he saw but he was about to have his own discovery. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed something else.

"Sire over here!" he called.

Dedede actually was glad to be called away from the gruesome sight. He turned and rushed toward the snail, joining him and looking down at the thing he was examining. This thing looked like the cast of shell of some kind, transparent and dropping some kind of foul smelling green liquid. He and escargoon stared at for the longest time, trying to figure out just what in the world they were looking at.

Whatever it was it looked nothing like anything they had seen before.

"Sire... do you think that..." escargoon started to say only to be cut off by a loud screeching noise.

"What in the name of Dreamland was that?!" Dedede exclaimed, startled and somewhat freaked out. He looked around at the dark forest, trying to see if he could spot what had made the sound.

Escargoon couldn't answer that question, as he also had no idea what kind of creature would make such a huge shell. He reached out and poked it with his finger, only for it to crumble the moment he did so.

"Hmmm..."

"What?!" Dedede demanded.

The snail began to explained. "It seems to be-"

Before he could finish the loud screeching sound cut him off.

"What was that?!" he asked, startled. He looked over his shoulder, scanning the woods around them.

Suddenly something came charging out of the trees, rushing straight for the unlucky pair. It was green colored with four glowing red eyes on either side of it's head. It had hands with long nasty claws and a mouth that looked more like a teeth filled cavern than anything.

"Holy calamary" Dedede exclaimed, eyes wide in terror. He quickly turned and ran back to the car.

"Wait for me!" Escargoon shouted, rushing after him as fast as his body would allow him.

They reached the car about the same time and both jumped it. The snail hit the gas getting the car going, pulling it backwards all the way. The monster chased after them for a few minutes before Escargoon managed to get the car turned around and, smashing the gas, rocketed the car out of the forest with a screech of tires.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

It was safe to say Dedede didn't hesitate in getting back in contact with the Nightmare salesman about the metroid he'd ordered, once he and Escargoon got back to his castle. As soon as the screen blinked on he proceeded to chew the man out for not being honest about the creature he'd purchased and accusing him of intentionally sending him an uncontrollable monster that could grow larger and suck people's bodies dry.

"I would have told you the whole description, Triple D, but you ran out of here so fast I couldn't," he informed him. "You were so _eager_ to try out your new pet."

"Yeah on _me_ ," Escargoon grumbled, folding his arms and giving the king a death glare. Dedede ignored him.

"Ya shoulda been up front with tha' info," Dedede snapped at the salesman. "How was I supposed to constitude that it would turn into a giant fire breathin' monster!?"

"Fire breathing monster?" the salesman looked a bit confused. "Um... can you describe it?" Dedede did so, once he finished the man said, stroking is chin thoughtfully. "Hmmm looks like the little fellow has already reached it's fourth stage. What you ran into in the woods is called a zeta metroid."

"Zeta metroid?!"

"Oh yes," the Salesman responded. "Though I never knew them to reach that stage so quickly."

"That quickly..." Escargoon frowned. He didn't like the sound of that. "Where did you get that thing?! Spill your guts!"

"Well we obtained it from some beings known as space pirates," he chuckled, once the realization hit him. "Now that I think about it, those space pirates have some nasty habits, like experimentation. They must have come up with a way to speed up its life cycle."

"What does that mean?!" The king of Dreamland inquired.

The Salesman laughed. "Oh nothing," he said, putting up his hands. "That is _if_ it doesn't go past this stage."

"And if it _does_?" Dedede wanted to know. "Then what's gonna happen?"

The man grinned. "Well you see you could either be having an omega to worry about and if worse comes to worse, a queen." he laughed again. "and believe me, you don't want to get on her bad side. But in case of the event of that happening, I would suggest running, would you like to buy a treadmill to practice, Triple D?"

The salesman's snide remark got his screen shut off.

"Sire, if that thing does reach a queen like he said it might shouldn't we be abandoning ship, so to speak?"

Dedede said nothing but for all intents and purposes he looked way more serious than he ever had in his life. The expression he had only made the snail's worry formulate into nothing short of terror. If the king was being uncharacteristically contemplative then it only meant they were in trouble.

Serious trouble.

* * *

While the King of Dreamland and his assistant were worrying about the Eldritch Abominations that made up the life cycle of the metroid species, Samus Aran was taking a tour of Dreamland with Tiff and the other children, completely oblivious to the danger that was intensifying with each passing hour.

The children had shown her quite a few places around the kingdom, like the area around the Booma Dooma volcano, though they avoided Dina Blade and her nest, and of course the beach. While they were there Kine came up to greet them and say hello to his crush, Tiff. The girl was polite to him, since he wasn't trying to flirt with her for once. He was more interested in the female bounty hunter as he's never seen a human Before, especially one so tall.

"Wow!" he said, staring up at the woman. "You're almost as pretty as Tiff!"

The girl blushed with embarrassment. ' _Kine_!" she exclaimed.

"What?" he asked. "It's true. Nobody will _ever_ be as pretty as you!"

Her face turned crimson. "Stop it!"

"Why Tiff?" he asked, confused. "Don't you want me to compliment you?"

Tuff and the other children chuckled as Tiff became more flustered Samus didn't really say anything about it because for all she knew Tiff and the fish were dating. It wouldn't matter to her anyway, since inter species romance was basically a normal thing in the Galactic Federation and she'd dated outside of her own species before as well.

Her attention then moved from Tiff and the others and over to Kirby who had wandered off further down the beach and was looking at the sand, picking up shells then putting them back down after a few seconds. She wondered what he was looking for and why the baby star warrior's face held such an intense expression. She walked over toward him to get a closer look at what he was doing.

When she did he looked up and her and then moved further away, making her stop and frown slightly. Why in the world was he moving away from her? Didn't he want her to see what he was doing? Was it something he would get in trouble for?

In trouble with who? she asked herself. Kirby didn't even have any parents.

Kind of like herself, except she'd had some people to raise her. Yes, they hadn't been humans but they had cared for her like she had been born as one of them. Kirby did seem to have some people taking care of her but Tiff and the others were only children.

Why wasn't Meta Knight raising him? she asked herself. Surely he knew about him and they both seemed to be the same species, at least that was her conclusion after seeing both of their faces. Did he not feel at least some kind of responsibility to him? They were both star warriors after all.

"Poyo!"

Kirby's voice brought her out of her thoughts. Samus looked down at the pink puff ball and saw he was holding something up to her. "What is it?" she asked him.

He got up on his tiptoes, trying to hand her something. She reached down to take whatever it was from him. She opened her hand and looked down at it.

In her hand was a small pink shell that looked like one of those a crab would make their home out of. She was certain that there was no crab in it, otherwise Kirby wouldn't have given it to her. She looked down at the baby star warrior.

"Is this for me?" she asked him.

"Poyo!" he squealed happily.

She smiled, closing her fingers around the gift. "Thank you Kirby," she said. "I'll treasure it always."

He squealed again, dancing up and down with joy. He was so happy she liked her present.

She reached down and patted him on the head, making him closer his eyes and smile happily. she sighed, her heart softening as she patted the cute little star warrior's head. She couldn't help wishing she could stay on the planet indefinitely just so she could spent more time with the little guy but she knew she would have to leave eventually.

Kirby was the protector of Dreamland and she had her own star system to protect, though for now things were quiet in the galactic federation. It was quiet here too, now that she thought of it. She knew that wasn't always the case, from what Tiff had told her as she's led her on a tour through dreamland. Sometimes monsters appeared but Kirby took care of them, though it bothered her a little that Meta Knight wasn't more helpful.

Oh she knew why he did it, it just seemed a bit excessive for a baby. The Chozo didn't leave her to fight monsters when she was only three, they'd waited to start her training until she was a little older. But Meta Knight wasn't the Chozo and he did things differently.

"Samus," Tiff's voice brought her out of her thoughts. She looked over her shoulder at the girl and the other children. "Hmmm?"

"What do you got there?" she asked the woman. "Did Kirby give you a present?"

Samus turned to the girl, opening her hand to show her and the others the shell Kirby had given her as a present.

'If Kirby gave you a present that means he really likes you," Tuff told her.

Tiff nodded, smiling up at the woman. "Kirby only gives things to people he thinks highly of," she explained. "and it looks like you're one of those people."

"Really," Samus smiled and closed her fist around the shell. "Then I'll be sure to take real good care of it."

Kirby let out another happy squeal and rushed off to find her more shells. The others watched him go, looking from one shell to another, hoping to find another perfect one.

"So Kirby arrived her in a star ship, right?" Samus asked Tiff.

The girl nodded. "Mmhmm," she answered. "It crash landed here, though Meta Knight told us that he wasn't supposed to wake up for a very long time, when he was an adult and a full fledged star warrior."

"Hm..." Samus continued to watch Kirby as she allowed the girl's words to sink in. "Has Meta Knight helped train Kirby at all since he's arrived here?"

The bounty hunter looked over at her. "Not exactly?" she asked, frowning slightly. "What do you mean by "Not exactly'?"

"Well you see," Tuff responded for his sister. "He gives Kirby but advice but kind of... let's him figure things out on his own."

"I see..."

Tuff could tell by the look on her face she didn't like that answer. "Hey, it's not like he doesn't help him out at all," he defended the veteran star warrior. "It's just-"

"He believes that allowing Kirby to do things for himself will help him improve," she cut him off. "even if it might cost Kirby his life."

"Yes, how did you know?" Tiff questioned her.

She turned from the children, her hand clenching into a tight fist that threatened to destroy the shell Kirby had given her. she relaxed her grip when she realized this, not wanting to crush it. "Sometimes Meta Knight takes it too far," she said after a moment. "He may be right but it doesn't always end up the way he expected it to. He should really take his own advice sometime, maybe then things won't wind up going bad."

The children looked at one another, having no idea what the bounty hunter was talking about. They waited for her to answer but she refused either unwilling to answer or unable to explain herself. Finally she turned to them, her expression returning to the smile she'd had before.

"Why don't you show me around some more?" she asked. "I'm sure you still have plenty of things for me to look at."

"Ummm sure," Tiff said, walking toward her. "Come on, I'll show you where Whispy Woods lives. Come on, Kirby, let's go!"

* * *

Meta Knight was feeling like a bit of a coward. Ever since he'd gotten back from his talk with Kabu he'd basically locked himself in his room, avoiding everyone, especially sword who was still trying to get answers out of him about why he had no plans to talk to Samus Aran. Maybe he could have lied about it, but that wouldn't have made the situation any better.

He knew he really shouldn't be avoiding her anyway as it was only making things worse for her and himself. He didn't even know why she'd come there anyway, only guessing her motive and it wasn't right. Why was he acting like a child about it anyway? It was completely out of character for him.

He looked out the window, taking in the view. Samus hadn't left the planet, he knew, she was still there and she wouldn't leave until she managed to make contact with him. It really was rather pointless to avoid her like he was, pointless and immature.

It would be better if he just got it over with and spoke to her. She couldn't, rather wouldn't hurt him, he was her friend and she didn't harm friends.

 _Just talk to her,_ a voice in his head spoke up. _What in the world are you afraid she'll do to you? She doesn't even know why you're avoiding her anyway. Nobody told her and she has no way of finding out what you did. For all you know this is a friendly visit and has nothing to do with that at all. Go see her, stop putting it off. If it is about that it's best you just get it all out in the open. You can't hide it forever, you know..._

 _I know that._

Not that it made any difference one way or the other.

Meta Knight headed for the door, reaching up and opening it. Sword saw him come out but he didn't approach him. It seemed he'd decided not to press the older warrior on the issue any further, which was a huge relief for the star warrior as he really didn't want to have to deal with the younger man's persistent pestering.

Satisfied with that he headed for the door, only to hear sword say. "Going out again?"

He paused and looked over at him. "Yes," he said with a nod. "Is there a problem?"

Sword merely shook his head and said. "No."

"Very well then." Meta Knight left the room before sword could say anything further.

"...Should have asked him again," Blade spoke up after the door had closed behind the veteran star warrior. "Why didn't you?"

"Because there was no point in doing so," Sword told his friend. "you know that. He would have just avoided the issue again and we wouldn't ave learned anything."

Blade let that sink in for a moment before he turned away from him. "...still should have asked him," he muttered.

* * *

Samus ha left Tiff and the other children after visiting Whispy Woods. She'd gone back to her ship to check on a few things and her companions had also headed out of the forest, making their way back to Cappytown. By then it had become early evening and it was time for them all to be heading home anyway.

On their way back the children discussed the day's events, from Samus' arrival to after she'd gone to her ship. Tiff was bothered by something and she felt the need to be open to the other's about it. Turned out they had all been feeling the exact same way, all but Kirby that was who was oblivious to the more serious matters going on around him.

"Do you think maybe something really bad happened between Samus and Meta Knight and that is why she came here?" she asked them. "I mean earlier the way she reacted to the news that meta knight isn't exactly really active in Kirby's development seemed to really get to her."

"Well you know, tiff, it is kind of weird how meta knight doesn't help Kirby all that much," Lalala pointed out.

'Yeah, he really could do more since he's a star warrior like Kirby." Lololo put in. "can you blame her?"

"Not really," she admitted. "but it's just... what do you think happened between them? Did you notice how she was talking to herself about Meta Knight repeating past behavior?"

"Do you think he might have trained her or something?" Tuff wanted to know.

The girl couldn't even begin to answer that question but her brother's question left her wondering.

Had he trained her in some way? But she had told them she had been trained to be a warrior by a species of aliens called the Chozo, there wouldn't be any reason for her to lie about that, given how her ship and her powersuit proved she was telling the truth about that.

"I guess we won't know until she talks to him," she said.

"But what if she wants to talk to him in private?" Lalala asked.

"It really isn't any of our business anyway," Lololo added.

Tiff knew they were right but it didn't make her feel any better and even if she didn't admit it to her friends she really wanted to know what went on between the two warriors. Had meta knight and her been romantically involved? Had they had a falling out? Maybe that wasn't it at all, maybe it was something else entirely.

But what?

"Oh my goodness! What happened here?!"

Lalala's voice brought the girl out of her thoughts. She looked in the direction the others were staring and her eyes widened.

Laying in the field before them were the dried up husks of the mayor's sheep.

The children stood at the edge of the forest, staring out at the vast field at what had once been a large flock of sheep. Except now the bodies in the field looked like all they ad been drained of water, laying brittle and emaciated on the ground.

"What kind of monster would do such a thing?!" Tiff exclaimed, putting her hands over her face as she turned away from the sight.

The others couldn't answer that question. Tuff, wanting to get a closer look, moved toward the dry husks.

"Be careful, Tuff!" his sister called after him.

He ignored her, stepping across the field to the sheep and reaching out his hand. The second his hand made contact with it it crumbled leaving behind nothing but dust. The boy gritted his teeth and let out a freak out sound now beginning to back away.

Just as he turned back to the others the Lola twins spotted something. "What's _that_!?" Lololo asked.

Tuff paused, looking over his shoulder. He caught sight of something coming out of the trees. From where he was neither he or the others could really make out what it was but a few seconds later it got closer and they were all about to get a good look at what it was.

What they saw seemed to be some kind of transparent jellyfish with three red eyes and fangs below the bulby orb instead of tentacles. It was also coming straight for them, emitting some rather disturbing sounds.

Tiff's eyes widened as sudden realization hit her and she shouted. "Run!"


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Tuff and the others needed no second bidding. The children turned and ran, except for Kirby who stood there staring. Tiff had to quickly run back, grab his hand, and pull him away from the creatures. They rushed away from the field, not looking back as they made a beeline for the forest they had just come out of only a few minutes ago.

As they ran Tuff glanced over is shoulder and yelped. "They're following us!" he exclaimed.

"Faster!" Tiff shouted to them all. "We have to out run them!"

The children increased their pace as best they could as they rushed through the trees hoping to outrun the strange creatures before they were able to catch up with them and do to them what they had done to the mayor's sheep.

Suddenly Tiff who was still holding tightly to Kirby's hand, stumbled over a tree root and fell to the ground. She hit the ground with Kirby landing beside her. As she started to get up she heard Tuff shout. "Look out, Tiff!"

She looked over her shoulder and saw one of the creatures making a beeline for her. She screamed and threw herself over Kirby to protect him, closing her eyes as she expected the worst.

CRRRRRRSSSSHHTT!

A cold blast of freezing energy hit the creature instantly turning it into a ball of ice. The frozen alien hovered there for a brief moment before it crashed into the ground and shattered. Tiff started to lift her head but a woman's voice commanded. "Get down!" and she ducked once more as a figure leaped over her.

She threw herself back onto the ground and closed her eyes, gripping Kirby tightly as she listened to somebody dealing with the creatures that had been chasing them. After a moment everything went silent then a voice said. "You can get up now, it's safe."

"Huh?" lifting her head, Tiff looked over her shoulder and found herself staring up into Samus' face. The bounty hunter was kneeling beside her looking a bit worried.

"Are you all right?" she asked.

"I-I think so." the girl sat up and looked behind Samus, seeing the remains of the creatures that had been chasing them laying in pieces on the ground. "What were those things?"

Samus closed her eyes and let out a sigh. "Those," the female bounty hunter began as she straightened herself up. "were metroids."

"Metroids? What's that?"

"Something that should not be on your planet," she looked back at the dead metroids on the ground, her face a mask of thoughtful calculation. "Something isn't right." She looked back at the children. Tuff and the others had come over to Tiff and were helping her and Kirby to their feet. "You wouldn't know anything about this, would you?"

"Why would we know?" Tiff demanded, looking shocked that the woman would even make such an assumption. "We've never even heard of such creatures before today!"

"Meta-Kn-" Samus stopped herself, frowning. The star warrior had never mentioned her before so there wasn't any way he would tell them about metroids either. "Hmmm..."

"Tiff," Tuff whispered to his sister. "what if King Dedede is the one who-"

"Even Dedede wouldn't do something like that," Tiff started to argue but then stopped before she completely finished the sentence. King Dedede had in the past done things similar, including turning completely innocent creatures into monsters. "Would he?"

Samus looked back at her. "Would he what?" she asked her. "Who is he?"

"Ummm King Dedede," Tiff said after hesitating for a moment.

The bounty hunter frowned. "What about him?"

The girl looked her in the eye. "We think he might have something to do with this."

* * *

Escargoon was feeling paranoid.

After he'd learned the entire story of why King Dedede had ordered the metroid and found out what might happen if it became a queen, he'd begun to worry. Even after the king tried to assure him they wouldn't have anything to worry about because he'd ordered the Waddle Dees to take care of it, the snail felt no better. He knew the Waddle Dees weren't exactly the most competent creatures on Popstar to deal with anything. They all usually wound up being knocked around and out of commission before too long.

In fact the only person who actually had any competency when dealing with monsters was Kirby. Or Meta Knight but he doubted the older Star Warrior would be willing to do anything about it, he'd probably think he was lying about it. If it came down to it Escargoon had no problem with having Kirby take care of them. At least then the problem would go away and he wouldn't be moving through the castle as if at any moment an energy leeching monster will pop out and suck him dry.

"All this just because he couldn't get over the fact that woman didn't show him respect," he muttered, sliding down the hall with his back up against the wall to make sure nothing would sneak up behind him. "He should have just let it go, it's not like sending a monster after her is going to make her change her mind-AHHHH!"

He hadnt been paying attention to where he was going and ran into Sword who had gone for a walk. His screaming scared the knight who also screamed with him until he exclaimed. "What are we screaming about?!"

"It's just _you_!" Escargoon exclaimed, staring wide eyed at the knight. "Why don't you warn people before sneaking up on them?!"

"I _wasn't_ sneaking," the knight told him, frowning under his helmet. "you walked into me!"

"Well you should still warn people you're coming," the snail shot back. "It's rude to just walk around and walk into people without saying anything."

Sword started to once again point out that Escargoon had been the one who had run into him but chose better of it. He wasn't going to win in an argument with the snail. It was best just to apologize and try to find out what had him on edge.

"Sorry," he said, "now would it be too much to ask as to why you're acting so strangely?"

"Strangely?" Escargoon asked. "who's acting strangely? I'm not acting strangely, you're just seeing things." he backed up, his hands up in front out him. "Nothing is wrong here, nothing at all."

"...Right..."

"Why are you still standing around here?" the snail suddenly demanded. "Go guard something!"

"Uh..." now Sword was feeling more confused. He decided it would be best if he just walked away before things got even stranger.

"You heard me, get moving!"

Without another word he turned and walked away, leaving the snail once more alone in the hall with his increasing paranoia.

But before he could get too far the snail called out. "Wait!"

Sword paused and looked over his shoulder. Now what?

"You umm.. haven't seen anything..odd flying around have you?"

Meta Knights companion had no idea what the snail was asking about but now he was beginning to feel suspicious. "No," he answered him anyway. "I haven't seen anything flying around today, why?"

"Oh nothing," Escargoon said, once again evasive. "I was just asking. "

"...Right."

"Just mind your own business!" he snapped again before charging away, giving the knight no chance to give him a retort.

* * *

Samus started heading toward King Dedede's castle without asking Tiff or the others anymore questions like why would the king of Dreamland be behind the sudden metroid invasion of Cappytown or how he managed to obtain them. All that she cared about was reaching the castle and getting to the bottom of things. Something told her that the answers were all in that stone building on the top of the hill and it was up to her and only her to deal with them.

None of the people of dreamland knew how to deal with metroids, nobody but one and something told her he wouldn't be willing to get involved, even if it did mean he was risking the lives of everyone he might remotely care about. Why he wouldn't, she still didn't know but she wasn't going to waste her time trying to figure that out. Getting rid of the metroids before they multiplied was much more important.

"Samus, wait up!" Tiff's voice called out to her.

The bounty hunter looked over her shoulder, realizing the children had come after her and were trying to keep up with her. She slowed her pace, giving them time to catch up with her. It would be best if she explained the situation to them, maybe they could help somehow.

When they caught up with her she turned to face them looking at Tiff when she immediately started talking to her.

"Why did you run off like that?" the girl asked her.

"Why are you asking me that?" Samus wanted to know. "You told me your king is responsible for the metroids being on Popstar, if that is true I need to take care of it as quickly as possible." she checked the settings on her arm cannon. "Right after I teach him a lesson about bringing energy sucking aliens onto his planet without bothering to research them first."

"What exactly are you going to do to him?" Tuff asked, looking at her arm cannon somewhat worriedly. "Because I wouldn't want to have it happen to me."

The bounty hunter realized why the boy looked nervous and lowered her arm. "I'm not going to kill him," she assured the him, feeling bothered by the fact he was even thinking that about her. "I'm just going to give him a little talking to."

"But what if he's not responsible?" Tuff continued. "I mean, yeah he's done real bad things but I don't think he's _that_ bad."

"Well," she said, turning back toward the castle. "I won't know until I actually get to talk to him. If you want to find out you can come with me and ask him yourself." she looked at Tiff now. "I mean, _you're_ the one who was so sure it was him to begin with."

The girl nodded. "okay," she said, though she sounded a little uncertain now. "Just as long as you don't-"

"I won't," Samus told her. "I promise." she continued on now with the children following close behind her.

Before they could take more than a few steps a piercing scream split the air. Samus paused a moment then after mentally figuring out the location by the direction it had come from took off toward Cappy Town.

Tiff looked at her brother and the others and then rushed after the bounty hunter, being followed closely after by Tuff, Lololo, Lalalala, and Kirby.

Just as the bounty hunter entered the village she came to an abrupt stop, her eyes widening as she took in the sight before her. Cappys old and young were running through the streets arms raised and faces covered in fear as metroids chased them down. If any slowed their pace even for a second the energy sucking aliens would latch onto them and begin to drain their energy. Some fell dead, having been drained too late for Samus to do anything to prevent it from happening.

At that moment one of the cappy children she'd run into before rushed by before tripping and falling to the ground immediately set upon by one of the metroids. The child screamed, flailing their arms vainly.

She swore, taking a slight step back as her helmet materialized on her head, before she thrust her arm forward and blasted the parasitic creature with a charge blast of ice. It let out a shriek before it was frozen solid, falling to the pavement and smashing into a million pieces.

"Samus!" the bounty hunter heard Tiff and the other children coming up behind her.

"Don't move!" she exclaimed, putting out her arm to halt them. "It's not safe here for you. Just stay back!"

Behind her Tiff instantly mirrored Samus posture, Tuff and the others stopped as well, though Kirby climbed on top of Tuff's head and looked up to watch. Samus rushed forward, aiming her arm blaster and freezing every metroid she caught sight of. As she froze them she would order the cappys to get out of there before any other metroids showed up and attacked them. They were all too happy to follow her instructions, rushing into the safest building they could find and barricading themselves inside.

By the time Samus was done dead metroids littered the street and only the mayor of Cappy Town was left outside. He stood up off the ground and turned to her, his small hand grasping his chest as he caught his breath.

"Thank you, Miss Aran," he said looking up at the tall woman.

"Where did the metroids come from?" she asked him. Maybe it hadn't been Dedede after all?

"The metroids? he looked around at the dead creatures then back at her, figuring out what she meant. "I don't know," he responded, taking off his hat to rub the top of his head. "They just came out of nowhere and started attacking everyone. We tried to make them stop but noting we did even scratched them." he noticed some dead cappy husks now and his tone turned sad. "Oh dear..."

"I'm sorry," she said, her tone softening. "If I had known they were here sooner I could have done something right away."

"You called those things metroids," the cappy responded, looking back at her. "what are metroids?"

"They are parasitic creatures that drain energy from other living creatures," she explained, looking at the dried up husks once more. "Sadly there is no way to return the energy back to the victim once it's all been absorbed. I'm sorry."

The mayor's expression turned to one of horror. "But where did they come from?" he exclaimed. "what could have brought them here?"

Samus' helmet vanished, revealing her face which held a grave expression, though her tone gave away that she was holding in her anger. No, it couldn't be anyone but their king. "I think I know _exactly_ what brought them here."

Then she turned and stormed out of the town before the cappy could ask her to elaborate.

* * *

Sword was still trying to figure out Escargoon's odd behavior when he suddenly stopped in his tracks and stood rigid in the middle of the hall. He had heard something that strange, like a faint sound.

A baby?

No, it couldn't be a baby. There weren't any babies in the castle, unless Lady Like had another child which was highly unlikely as he had not seen her with the belly. So if it wasn't a baby what-

A bad feeling suddenly washed over him and he spun, unsheathing is sword and swinging it in one movement. The blade hit something soft that made an unhappy shrieking sound. Sword's eyes widened under his helmet as he found himself staring at a strange looking blob, floating in the air before him.

What the-

Suddenly the creature let out an angry scream, backing away from the blade and then lunging at him. The young warrior let out a yell; and swung is sword again, making contact with the creature with the flat of the blade, he harmlessly struck the creature, the force of the blow tennis racketing the beast back against the wall.

It remained there a moment, stunned.

Sword didn't wait for it to recover. He turned and took off down the all, making a bee line for the chambers he shared with Meta Knight and Blade. The star warrior had to be told about this.

"Meta Knight!" he yelled, bursting into the room. "Where are you Meta Knight?! We have a serious problem on our hands!"

But the apartment was quiet. Nobody was there.

"Meta Knight?" Where had the older knight gone? Has he left? But where? What could he possibly have gone to at such an inconvenient time?!

"Meta Knight?" he looked in the old star warrior's room but it was empty.

"Not here..." Blade's voice spoke up behind him.

He turned to face his friend. "Where did he go?" he asked him.

Blade, not picking up on his companion's urgent tone, shrugged carelessly. "Dunno," he replied. "Why? You wanted him for something?"

Sword's eyes widened under his helmet. Didn't he realize what was going on in the castle? Hadn't he gone out of the apartment? He very nearly blew up at Blade but then reigned himself and instead began to explain to him why he was looking for Meta Knight and what was going on inside the castle and possibly outside in the kingdom at well. Blade listened to his friends story without comment though, by the time Sword was finished he seemed just as nervous as he was. It wasn't hard to figure out why.

"What should we do? he asked him.

"Find Meta Knight," Sword responded. It was the only thing he could think of. "Before things get out of hand."

 _/welp i am finally getting to working on this story more even though nobody was really even reading it to begin with. whatever. i want to finish it._


	7. Chapter 7

CHAPTER 7

Escargoon reached his chambers without running into any parasitic creatures and began to barricade himself inside. If there _were_ more metroids out there like the ones that had attacked him and Dedede in the fores,t he was going to be one hundred percent certain they would not get to him. No way was he going to wind up like the dried up husks he and the King had discovered out there.

"That should do it," he backed away from the door, wiping his hands off as he stood back to admire his handwork. "that should keep any energy draining parasites from getting in here!"

Before him, blocking the door, was nearly all the furniture in his room save his desk, stacked up into some kind of barricade. Only someone with the strength of a thousand star warriors would be able to move all of that, just looking at it made him feel a whole lot better. Those floating jellyfish were way too weak to get through it plus they didn't even have any limbs to move it.

"That monster with them in the forest will never reach the castle," he told himself. "It's too stupid to find its way back here."

Humming to himself, he turned away from the mess blocking his door and slid over to his desk which was one of the few things in his room not in his barricade. Time to get some work done. Maybe he could even think of some way to get rid of the metroids before anyone found out they were on the planet.

Sadly that was not to be, just as Escargoon sat down in his chair he heard a very familiar squeak. Uh oh. He lifted his head, spotting a metroid floating right in front of his face and that was when he realized he'd forgotten to close the window!

"AHHHHH!"

The barricade proved to be worthless as the panic stricken snail burst through the door, leaving behind him a snail shaped hole, running down the hall screaming at the top of his lungs.

"YOUUUUUUUUUUUUR MAAAAAAAAAAGESTY!"

* * *

Things had gotten worse at the castle, as the metroid invasion grew greater. Outside on the path leading up to the structure Samus took out as many of the creatures as she could, freezing any that entered her sight. A little further down the path Tiff, Tuff, Kirby, and the Lola twins followed after her, one of them yelling out to her if they spotted a metroid she might have missed.

What they were all wondering was how did so many of the creatures appear so quickly when everything had been fine and peaceful only a few hours ago. How long had the metroid been there? Had it been there for months and nobody had noticed it? By the look on Samus' face it didn't matter either way, if it was in the past or recent she was going to deal with it.

She was the only one who could.

Tiff and the kids weren't behind her because they couldn't catch up with her they were giving her space because they knew she was angry and they didn't want to risk saying the wrong thing to her. Just pointing out metroids blocking their way only served to put her in worse foul mood and the last thing any of the children wanted was for her to yell at them. Best just letting her kill the metroids and making Dreamland safe once more.

"Hey, Kirby, why can't you help her with that?" Tuff wanted to know, glancing at Kirby who was rubbing beside him. "I mean it looks like all you have to do is freeze them. So why don't you suck up some of her beam and become ice Kirby?"

Kirby looked over at him, looking a bit confused. Of course the young star warrior hadn't even thought about it. Why should he when the bounty hunter was taking care of it all and it didn't look like she needed any help.

Tiff surprisingly spoke up end that suggestion. "I don't think she's appreciate that," she whispered to Tuff. "she might be insulted if he did that."

"But if Kirby helps her those creatures would be taken care of a lot easier," the boy wanted to argue. "she might even be grateful."

"Let's wait," she told him. "If things get worse then Kirby can help her out."

His sister's suggestion made sense so he nodded. "I just hope things don't get worse."

* * *

King Dedede had been hoping the metroids wouldn't explode into a huge problem and he could hide the fact he ordered one from everybody until he thought of a solution himself. However, barely a three hours had gone by before it became apparent that none of his plans were going to go the way he wanted them to.

It all started when a mob of Waddledee's rushed by the open door to the throne room as if something large and nasty was chasing them. Freaked out but also curious he got out of his throne and walked toward the door, peeking around the half open door to look down the hall in the direction the waddle Dee's had come from.

For a few seconds he couldn't see a thing but in the gloom of the hall a shadow started to rise up, it's large frame taking up more and more of the hall as it drew nearer. The king's eyes widened in horror when a large pair of red glowing eyes locked onto him and a terrifying roar shook the castle. That was all he needed, the large penguin king let out an expletive then took off after the waddle Dees, flailing his arms and legs and screaming at the top of his lungs.

* * *

Sword and Blade gad left the castle before things had gotten worse so they were unaware of the ensuing mayhem as they searched the surrounding area for their mentor.

"Where in the world could meta knight have gone?" Sword asked as he and blade searched the surrounding forest.

His companion couldn't give him a single answer to that question. What was he expecting anyway? Blade had already told him he didn't know where te Knight had vanished. It was just odd that he would disappear at such a bad time. He was usually the first person to show up when a threat appeared.

Did his mysterious absence have to do with the bounty hunter woman who'd arrived earlier that day?

The events were just too close together not to be connected. Which only made sword wonder just what the heck had happened between the two even more. But now wasn't the time to be dwelling on that mystery.

There were terrifying energy draining monsters attacking people and it was time for them to bring in someone who could deal with it. Because Sword felt Kirby would not be enough to deal with it this time. That is if they managed to find him.

"Meta Kni-" the young knight wasn't able to finish his sentense because he was suddenly boweled over by Blade who had suddenly got freaked out by something.

"Blade wha-" he started to asked a question but was interrupted once again by a loud roaring sound that had him looking over his shoulder in time to see some giant multi-eyed, multi toothed, monstrosity come barreling toward him.

His eyes widened under his helmet and he was on his feet in less than a second, rushing after Blade who had a pretty good head start, though he caught up pretty quickly. Whatever is was he did not want to be anywhere near it. But a loud roar and her sound of heavy footsteps let him know that the creature was giving chase.

"It's coming after us!" Blade exclaimed, beginning to panic. "We gotta get out of here!"

Sword did not want to look over his shoulder to find out the truth of that statement, because the thing sounded like it was right behind them.

"Look out!"

A crescent yellow beam shot out of the trees and the two knights ducks to the ground as there was a loud crash behind them. The monster chasing them roared in pain and anger when the beam struck it, knocking it back into the trees.

As the two looked up a figure landed in front of them. It was meta knight . His sword was unsheathed and he did not look happy. Before they could say anything the star warrior sheathed his sword, grabbed the two knights by the wrists and started running.

"We must get out of here!"

The three dashed through the forest, putting as much distance between themselves and the monster chasing them. Now that Meta Knight had given them some distance they were actually able to out run it. Before long the beast was out of sight and the three warriors exited the forest where they slowed their pace then stopped so they could catch their breath now that it was safe to do so.

"I think we are safe now for the moment," Meta Knight said.

Sword had caught his breath enough to speak now. "What in the world was that thing?!" he exclaimed, pointing back into the woods.

"It is a a metroid," the star warrior exclaimed.

"Metroid? What is a metroid?"

Meta Knight wrapped his cape around himself as he began to explain. "It is a parasitic creature that feeds by draining the life energy from other creatures.," he began. They are alien beings created by a race of highly advanced creatures named Chozo from the far off planet of Zebes, They start their lives as eggs which hatch into small jellyfish like larva which over time grow bigger then slowly change form into increasingly more horrible beasts."

"They-" the star warrior's description of the infants reminded him of the creature that had tried to attack him back at the castle. It had been a metroid? But Meta Knight had just said metroids were native to a planet named Zebes. Then how did they get to Popstar?

"What are they doing here?"

"I believe it is due to the female bounty hunter." Meta Knight responded. "They did not appear until she arrived here."

Was meta knight saying that Samus Aran had brought the metroids with her? Why? Was her reason for wanting to speak to the star warrior something sinister after all? Did she intend to use these metroids to kill him? If so why?

"Do you believe she brought them?" Sword asked him. "Why would she bring such creatures here, Meta Knight?"

The star warrior turned to look at him now. His eyes briefly flashed a different color but it was so quick the younger knight could not make out what it was, before he answered him. "I do not believe she brought them with her," he answered him. "She would not do something like that intentionally."

"Then who-" he started to ask him.

"We do not have time for this now," the star warrior cut him off. His tone grew urgent now as he spoke again. "we must return to the castle and make sure they have no reached it yet."

"Uh about that.."

"What?"

"They already have," Sword replied. "That's why me and Blade were out here looking for you."

The way Meta Knight looked at him before he took off running toward the castle, surprised him. Was that... fear?

* * *

Dedede had not run that much in his entire life as he was chased around the castle by the monsters who had been joined by more creatures that looked like the metroid he'd ordered from the holy nightmare corporation only bigger. He was so focused on outrunning them he didn't take the time to notice how many metroids were floating around, an obvious indication that something was making more.

The king of Dreamland was chased full circle around the castle, coming back to where he started. He saw that as an opportunity to dash inside his throne room and bolt the door shut, putting a heavy wooden door between himself and the beasts running and floating around the rest of the building. He panted as he leaned against the door, taking a moment to get his heart to stop tap dancing in his chest.

While he did this he took a moment to wonder how that creature had gotten to his castle so quickly? He and Escargoon had gotten out of those woods so fast there was no way it could have followed him all the way there in less than a couple hours. Especially since it hadn't even seen where he and the snail and driven off to.

So with those questions out of the way with no answers it was time to figure out what to do about it. Maybe he could contact the salesman and order some kind of monster to get rid of the metroid creature, but something told him that the man would not be willing to help him out since he seemed so amused by the fact that the metroid he'd given them had grown up so quickly.

A loud pounding on the door brought him out of his thoughts, sending him scurrying away from it in fright. He spun around and faced the door, staring at it now as something large and heavy slammed against the solid wood, not only wondering what in the world was on hte other side but freaking him out further as he began to slowly back away from it.

"Whatevah you are out there just stay there," he said, his tone pleading. "Just go attack something else, like Escargoon, or the cappies, or Kirby."

The pounding continued and he yelped, dashing behind his throne and using it as a shield, as if a simple piece of furniture would protect him from those murderous beasts. Maybe he could use his hammer to fight it off? Or maybe it would just go away and he wouldn't have to do anything.

He wouldn't have to worry about any of that it turned out.

The doors were once again hit by something heavy, this time so hard it nearly blew them off their hinges. He screamed and ducked down wrapping his arms over his head to protect himself but just then he became of a loud growling behind him and looked up, his eyes resting on an even bigger monster, a multi-eyed beast with a round mouth filled with sharp teeth, sharp clawed hands, and thick scale like armor.

It was looking down hungrily at the fat, pengion king.

For a moment his brain shut down at he stared up at the green and brown monster looming over him and all he could do was watching it, his mouth hanging wide open. Then he started to scream. Te beast obviously did not like tat and roared in anger before it lunged down at him.

Suddenly, just when he thought it was over, something crashed into the beast knocking it backward. He stared wide eyed as the person in te red and yellow power-suit shoved their foot into the creatures's neck and fired shot after shot of a blue colored beam of energy down its throat. It flailed its limbs and screeched but couldn't prevent the armored warrior from firing inside it, then changed shape, curling up into a little ball and dropping inside the creature.

A second later the beast let out a roar of distress the instant before it exploded into a thousand pieces. Dedede screamed and crawled around the other side of his throne as chunks of it flew in all directions. Then there was silence. Dedede realized this and wondered what happened. He raised his head and peaked over the top of his throne, finding himself into the serious face of Samus Aran. Her expression was like a stone but her icey blue eyes were windows to the fact she was inwardly seething.

"King Dedede," she said in a voice that held another hint of that anger along with a flat tone. "I would like to have a word with you."


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Dedede stared into the intense face of Samus Aran with utter shock. She had killed that giant saw toothed monster without breaking a sweat and now she had all of her attention on him, the very fact she'd accomplished that feat in less than thirty seconds not only was impressive but terrifying. The penguin monarch's brain once again shut off and all he could do was gape at her with the most ridiculous expression on his face. Mouth hanging wide open and eyes bugging out of his head. She'd said something to him but he hadn't understood a word but the way she was glaring at him told him he'd better say something or he'd wind up like the monster who was now a pile of bloody gibs all over the throne room floor, ceiling, and walls.

The king opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to come up with a coherent sentence, some kind of response that didn't make him sound like a much mouthed moron. "I...I..." he shook his head to clear it and started over. "What did ya' want again?"

The bounty hunter leaned toward Dedede's face, her blue eyes like ice. "Where did you get the metroids? Who gave them to you and why did you even allow them to come to your planet?"

"Uh..." he was having a real hard time coming up with answers to her questions. With the condition his brain was in, due to the events of the past few hours he was having a real hard time mentally comprehending anything she inquired about.

Samus slammed her hand down hard on the back of his throne, making him jump. She grasped it in a fist and leaned closer to him as she repeated her question in a cold voice. "Where did you get the metroids, King Dedede?"

He panicked, stepping backward and waving his hands in front of him as he babbled out an answer. "It wasn't my fault!"" he exclaimed. "How was I supposed ta know it was gonna turn into such a hideous monster!?"

"Where did you get it?" she asked again, not in the mood for excuses.

Dedede could see he couldn't just try changing the subject and get her focus elsewhere. Why should he not tell her anyway? Things had just gotten majorly out of hand since he let the salesman send him that metroid larva in a jar, so he had no need to protect the man.

"I got it from Holy Nightmare!" he blurted out.

If it were possible her glare got even colder. "What is Holy Nightmare?" she snapped, leaning so close her arm canon was now resting under the penguin's chin. He had to be lying, she'd never even heard of such a place."and why would they have access to metroids?"

Dedede replied honestly. "I don't know know!" he proclaimed. "They sell monsters! The sales man said he got it from space pirates."

Space pirates! Now things were beginning to make some sense, though it didn't answer her biggest question. "Why did you buy it?"

* * *

When Samus had entered the castle she had taken off in the direction of the king's throne room after Tiff had given her direction. After she'd left the children they had gone in a different direction, all running toward the apartment chambers where Tiff and Tuff lived with their parents. They had to make sure the adults hadn't met the same fate as the sheep and cappys down in the village. Along the way they did their best to avoid being attacked by or even encountering metroids who seemed to have taken up residence in the large stone structure. Waddle Dee's ran past them, nearly all being chased by the floating creatures, all seeming to just want to escape the energy draining monsters.

"Mom! Dad!" Tiff shouted as she and her brother pushed open the door to their apartment. Just as they entered the children heard a scream. "That's mom!"Tiff exclaimed and they all rushed into the living room to find Lady Like, Tiff and Tuff's mother sitting pressed against the wall, with wide terrified eyes as her husband and the children's father Sir Ebrum stood protectively in front of her, valiantly smacking away at a a group of metroid with the handle of a broom.

"Back! Back, you vile beasts!" he was yelling as he fought them all off.

The metroids didn't really seem to be very aggressive as they were very easily swatted away and seemed to bounce harmlessly off each other like balloons. Either that or the kid's father had a really accurate swing and they were keeping their distance after being pummeled soundly enough to be intimated. It looked like the ground was hovering about and watching him swing away like a professional baseball player.

Tiff concluded that the metroids were merely waiting for er father to tired out before attacking so, thinking quickly, she rushed into the kitchen grabbed a bucket and then turned on the ice maker on the fridge. placing the bucket under the maker she filled the bucket then dashed back into the living room and chucked the ice onto the metroids who all squealed unhappily before making a mad dash out of the window. It wasn't until after her parents watched them fly out of the window with opened mouthed surprised did they even notice their children had even returned home.

"Children!" Lady Like exclaimed.

"Mom, dad!" Tiff exclaimed as her brother asked. "are you guys all right?"

"Well we are now, son," Sir Ebrum said, now looking from the open window that Kirby had jumped onto and was looking out the window to watch the metroids fly away, to the bucket of ice his daughter still held. "How did get those tings to leave?"

"Ice," Lalala spoke up, hovering near Tiff to get a better look.

"Metroids are weak to it," the girl explained to her parents.

"How did you-"

"Samus told us," Tuff responded before his father could finish asking te question.

"Samus?" Lady Like said, now standing up. "Who is Samus?"

But Tiff was in a hurry and didn't give the others time to explain. "have you seen King Dedede?" she asked before the others could answer. "we need to talk to him. It's really important."

"I haven't seen him," Sir Ebrum replied. "Why? Do you think he has something to do with those strange creatures?"

Tiff nodded. "Who else cold be responsible?"

"Oh my," her father didn't look thrilled about that. Lady Like muttered under her breath. "I knew it."

"If I know King Dedede," Sir Ebrum said. "I would think he's probably in his throne room watching everything that is happening on his TVs. Maybe he's there?"

That made sense. "Come on, Tiff," Tuff said to her. "If he in his throne room then Samus will be there too and she's probably making him confess at this very moment."

* * *

Meta Knight and his companions didn't come across much trouble on their way to the castle. By then Samus had taken down most of the metroids hovering around the area. The star warrior was at first surprised and relieved by then but then he realized who was responsible for it and he could,'t stop himself from having mixed feelings about it, even though he knew he shouldn't be bothered by it.

It only served as a reminder that he was going to have to address the elephant in the room were still metroids in the area, like the one in the forest and only one person had the skills and firepower to create a permanent solution to it all, and that one person wasn't going to leave Popstar even after she took care of the aliens, until she finally got to talk of him.

"Meta Knight," Sword's voice brought the older star warrior out of his thoughts. he looked over at the young knight and his companion. "How many of those things do you think are out there?" sword questioned him, pointing at a sole wondering metroid whom Samus had missed on her way to the castle.

"I do not know," he admitted to him. "There could be very few or many. There could even be ones bigger than the one we encountered in the forest. All that I know is we ave to find the source of them being here and remove it before more show up and infest the entire planet of Popstar." He now turned is attention back to Dedede's castle. "Come, we must get to the castle because I am almost one hundred percent certain that is where we will get all of our answers."

The two knights nodded and then the trio crossed the remaining ground to the castle were they ran across the lowered drawbridge and onto the grounds. At one point a metroid flew at them which Meta Knight batted away with his sword. Given the fact that conventional weapons did very little damage to the beings it was pointless to try to take any out at that time, smacking them away was the best course of action right now, finding the king was. So far he was seeing no more metroids like the one in the forest, only the small jellyfish like ones.

Hopefully there wasn't a queen nearby... Hopefully the one they'd run into in the woods wouldn't become a queen. They had to act fast before enough time passed for one of them to become a queen.

As they crossed the garden and stepped into the dark halls of the caste it became apparent that the metroid problem wasn't just limited to the outside. More metroids floated up and down the corridors, some chasing after the random waddle Dee who were running faster than anyone thought possible. The three knights, though knowing they could not take out the metroids rushed forward to at least give the waddle dees a chance to escape unharmed and find a safe hiding place.

As they did so they nearly ran past the kids who were heading in the same direction as them only at a slower pace, though the warriors slowed down to keep in step with them.

"what are you doing out here," Meta Knight asked them. "it is far too dangerous for you to be running around like this."

"We're going to talk to King Dedede," Tiff explained to him, looking over at the star warrior who ran beside her. "we're going to find out if he's responsible for the monsters."

Though is mask hid his expression the knight's tone made it clear he did not approve of the children running around exposed to metroids. "Even if he is," he responded. "You should not be out ere. There are still many of these creatures flying around and any one of them could very easily attach themselves to you and drain your life." he swatted away a metroid that flew too close for comfort. "If one of them does there is no way to reverse it."

Tiff did not have a comeback for that statement because he knew she was aware of this fact herself, seeing as she and the other children had all been hanging out with the female bounty hunter all day. Speaking of the hunter, where was she at at the moment? He could only guess that she was off dealing with the metroids herself, after all she was the only person who had the equipment to take them out.

Either way neither Tiff or the rest of the children seemed to have any plans to turn around and go somewhere safe until the treat was over, he should not have expected anything else from them, especially from someone as stubborn as Tiff. Knowing this he and his cohorts Sword and Blade stayed close to the children, protecting them all as the group made their way to King Dedede's throne room.

* * *

Dedede told Samus Aran everything about why he bought the metroid, to teacher a lesson, to how it got loose to begin with, she sternly lectured him about playing such horrible pranks on people he considered friends, and by the time he was done she knew everything except for one last thing.

"Where is the queen?"

"The what?"

She frowned at him. "You said you only ordered one metroid," she reminded him. "and that one metroid got away and then the rest of these metroids showed up afterward. Obviously the one you bought became a queen and that is why there are so many of them outside and in the castle." she folded her arms. "that is the only way so many metroids have shown up in such a short amount of time."

"I don't know where no queen is!" the king insisted, knowing right away what she was implying. "Like I told ya, I haven't seen that metroid since it flew out da winda'!"

Darn! She should have known he wouldn't be able to give her that piece of vital though he and his snail escort had chased it into the forest it had scared them off when they'd found it. Who knew where that metroid was now? It could still be in the forest or it had found somewhere else to complete it's life cycle. She was going to have to find it herself and it wasn't going to be easy going on what little information she'd received.

"Where in the forest did you spot this metroid?" she demanded. Much as she loathed to do so she was going to have to return to the location and see if she could pick up on the creature's trail and track it from there. Hopefully the king of dreamland could show her exactly where that was.

"How should I know?" he exclaimed. "It came right at us, I didn't stay around long enough to pick up no landmarks."

"Well you're going to have to remember," Samus told him, grabbing the top of his head and easily lifting him up off the floor. "Because you're going to come with me and help me find it!"


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Meta Knight, the other knights, and the children reached Dedede's throne room the same time Samus came storming out of it with her unwilling companion. She was holding tightly to the back of his neck as she and the King of Dreamland entered the hall. King Dedede was struggling in her grip and making a huge ruckus even though she ignored his protests. As she and the penguin king went by, neither noticed the group who had stopped to watch them.

"Where are they going?" Lololo asked as he and the others continued to watch the two figures move further down the hall.

None could answer that question but it was obvious every one of them wanted to find out. However Meta Knight had his own plans and turned to Sword and Blade to give them instructions.

"Men, take the children back to their parents," he ordered. "It is not safe for them to be out here."

"Hey wait, Meta Knight!" Tiff exclaimed, knowing what he was getting at. "You can't just-"

The Star Warrior turned sharply to face her, cutting off the rest of her protest. "I do not want to hear any arguments, Tiff," he said his tone making it very obvious he was not in the mood to deal with her stubborness. "Just do as I say and go home. Take Kirby with you. I know you will be able to protect him if something happens."

"But what about you?" she asked.

"I have something I need to take care of," was his answer. "Now do as I say."

Before she could protest Meta Knight had run off, leaving the girl and the others behind.

Sword and Blade moved to obey the star warrior's order. "Come on, Tiff," Sword said, stepping forward and facing the children. "Let's get you back to your parents."

"All right," Tiff said, moving to follow the others though she did pause to look back in the direction Meta Knight had gone. Something wasn't right, the Star Warrior's behavior seemed off, she just couldn't quite figure out why.

"Tiff," Sword's voice brought her out of her thoughts. "come on."

The girl looked back at him and began to follow the rest of the group back to her family's apartment. Luckily for them they did not run into anymore trouble from metroids who all seemed to have left the castle, leaving the halls relatively empty. The group were grateful for that, as it got rid of the problem for the time being.

Just as they reached the door to their living quarters, Tuff noticed something. Has anyone seen Kirby?"

"What?" Blade exclaimed.

"I don't see Kirby," Tuff replied. "I thought he was with us, but I don't see him anymore."

Sword and Blade looked around and saw that the boy was right, Kirby was not with them. Oh great, now what were they going to do? The only thing they could do, drop the rest of the children off at their suit and then going looking for him.

"All right then," Sword said, escorting the children toward the door. "We need you to go inside and stay there, we'll go and see if we can find Kirby."

While the other kids headed inside Tiff was more slow to follow, in fact she stopped in her tracks and then spun around and took off in the opposite direction.

"Tiff!" Sword called after her. "Come back here! Where do you think you're going?!"

She ignored the knight, speeding up her pace instead of slowing down, she was out of sight before too long. Sword and Blade quickly ushered the rest of the kids into the apartment, realizing now they had two kids to go after and bring back instead of one.

No surprise it was Tiff.

That was the plan anyway until Lady Like decided she wanted the two knights to stick around and protect her and her family. Both were too polite to decline and the Lady was just like her daughter, stubborn. It was best to just do what she wanted them to do.

* * *

Elsewhere in the castle Samus Aran had drug King Dedede to his limo and tossed him into the driver's seat of it. She then climbed in after him, though she barely fit since she was much taller than the king, which is why she stood instead of sitting down in the passenger seat. He tried to protest with her about it, claiming he didn't know how to drive the thing but she wasn't have any of it. She glared at him and snapped.

"Just drive," and he did so without any further protest. It wasn't like he was going to argue with her any further, not with that giant gun aimed at his head. With that he hit the gas and sped out of the castle grounds and down the road to the forest.

The car and its passengers passed quickly through Cappy Town and into the woods. Samus did not day a single word the entire way there but King Dedede could sense by the rather terrifying aura surrounding her that hesitating or trying to convince her to change her mind was a very bad idea. She was bound and determined to find that thing and she was going to make him show her where it was. Not too long after the car had put Cappytown way behind them, the king took it into the forest then drove it in as far as he was able. Once the car was driven to its limits she made him park the car and then forced him to go on foot, leading him along with an arm cannon aimed at his back.

"It was around here," King Dedede explained leading the bounty hunter to the exact spot where the giant metroid had attacked him and Escargoon, a small clearing of which the two had just stepped into.

Samus, activating her helmet to use the visor's multiple functions, looked around the clearing and the surrounding woods, hoping to pinpoint where it had gone. After a moment the infered picked up on a faint heat signature. She deactivated her visor and grabbed onto the King's robe. "Let's go."

He protested now. "Hold it!" he exclaimed. "I showed ya where me an' Escargoon saw the monsta' now it's time to let me go-."

"Wrong," she cut him off. "This entire situation is your fault and you're going to take responsibility for it." he started to protest again but she interrrupted him. "and I do not want any arguments!"

Dedede shut his mouth, deciding it was best he kept his beak shut from then on. He'd been hoping to weasel his way out of the situation after taking Samus to the location of the monster, but that was not going to happen. Instead he merely nodded and allowed himself to be drug by her, deeper into the woods.

Further in, the hunter paused when she heard roaring. Dedede nearly jumped out of his skin when he heard it and grabbed onto her leg, looking around in panic. If they could hear it, it meant that the beast was close by and it would attack them any second.

Why wasn't she doing anything? The least she could do was make sure he was safe, why couldn't she at least show enough respect to protect a king? What was _wrong_ with her?!

And just as he was beginning to feel more offended than scared Samus suddenly grabbed him by the back of his robe and jumped into the air. A heavy mass hit the ground where they had been standing and when Dedede looked down he saw something almost completely identical to the monster in his throne room. It looked up at them and roared.

Dedede screamed in panic, wiggling in the bountry hunter's grip as she landed on the high branch of a tree and dropped him off there before jumping down to deal with the metroid.

She rushed at it, getting within a few inches of the metroid before jumping into the air over top of it and firing her ice beam at it's face and mouth. The beast roared at her, expelling a blast of fire from it's mouth, melting the ice before it reached it. This didn't deter her as she rushed around behind it, firing missiles at it to distract it.

Her strategy worked as it became so focused on destroying her projectiles she got close enough to it that she could jump right onto its face and shove her arm cannon right into its mouth, blasting ice inside of it as it flailed around helplessly. After too long the creature stopped moving, having been frozen from the inside out. Samus then repeated the same process on it as she had on the one in the throne room, going into morph ball mode and setting off an explosive charge inside the body which detonated and blew the creature to pieces.

Samus stood over the creature's remains for a moment before turning away from it. She walked toward the tree where she'd left King Dedede and stared up at him as he clung to a branch. "Hey!" he yelled down at her. "Get me down from here!"

Samus obliged, aiming her arm cannon at the tree.

"Hey, wait a minute!" he exclaimed, flailing his arms. "I didn't mean like that! Don't do anythin-" she fired, shooting a missile at the branch and sending him plummeting to the ground. "AHHH!"

She caught him easily and set the fat king on the ground. "Let's go."

"Go?!" he demanded. "we found the monster in the woods now I can go home."

"Wrong," she corrected him. "That is not the monster I am after. The one I want is bigger and still out there." she deactivated her visor to frown down at him. "What we're looking for is a queen and the metroid over there is not a queen," she gave him a push. "Now get moving!"

King Dedede did as he was told, though he still had to wonder what the point was. Did she expect him to be able to tell her where the "queen" was? How was he even going to do that when the only location he was aware of where a metroid was, in the woods, and she'd already killed the beast! What more did she think he could do or tell her?

Besides, how in the world was she even going to find that queen?

He got his answer a moment later when the bounty hunter headed to the part of the forest on the other side of the clearing where the beast had come running out of. she then knelt down and scrutinized something on the ground. This got him curious and he couldn't help glancing over her shoulder to get a peek at whatever she was looking at.

When she suddenly straightened up he had to back away a few steps so not to get hit in the nose by her elbow.

"Come on." she said to him. She grabbed onto his arm and led him further into the forest.

"Hey, here are we going? What did you see?"

"I picked up its trail," she explained, not looking at him as they continued on. "It is going to lead us to the nest of the metroid queen."

From then on it was easier to continue the search, however Samus proceeded with more caution. If her theory was right things were going to get more dangerous. Maybe she should just let the penguin king go, but she'd resolved to teach him a lesson before she did. It was his fault after all and he was going to take some responsibility, but if things got so bad his life would be in real danger then she'd just let him go.

She was angry at him for causing this situation in the first place but not enough to let him die. After all, he did not know the being he was buying could devastate a planet in a matter of hours. But Tiff had explained Dedede did pretty often orders monsters to kill Kirby who was a little baby, so she wasn't going to let herself feel sorry for the patriarch either. An innocent victim he was not and she was going to give him a stern lecture about it after all of this was over.

Hopefully he would learn something.

Half an hour later the duo had put the forest behind them and were now heading to a place that looked like some kind of canyon. Samus paused, and looked down at King Dedede.

"What is this place?" she asked him, pointing into the canyon. "What is down there?"

The King looked up, warily eyeing the canyon before them. "Kabu canyon," he responded. "There's nothin' much there except Kabu."

"Who is Kabu?"

"Well he's this big talking rock," he explained. "I mean he doesn't do much else but predict the fucha' sometimes."

"Anything else?" there had to be more to this Kabu than that. She looked into the canyon, a thoughtful look on her face.

Dedede shook his head. "Naw." For a moment he wondered why she was even asking him the questions then he remembered that the reason they were out there to begin with was to find out where the beast in the forest had come from. Obviously she was so interested in Kabu canyon was because she believed that that was where the queen was located and now that he thought about it... "Ya can't go lookin' in there!"

The bounty hunter frowned. "and why not?" she wanted to know.

"Because, uh," he was having a hard time coming up with an excuse. "There's nothin' there."

Samus eyes flickered to the footprints, barely distinguishable on the rocky ground, and then back at the penguin king. "I guess we'll just have to go down there and make sure."

* * *

Kirby had followed after Meta Knight after he'd left the children at the castle. The young star warrior could tell something bad was going on and he felt he needed to step in and help. Until Sword and Blade's attention was focused on the other children before he'd taken his chance and rushed away, taking off after the older star warrior.

But he'd lost sight of Meta Knight and wandered out of the castle and onto the road, nearly getting run over by Dedede's car when it shot out of the castle grounds. He'd spotted Samus in the car and had taken off in pursuit of them, completely forgetting about the star warrior.

Wherever she was going with him it surely had to do with the metroids, right? If she ran into trouble he was going to be there to help. Kirby intended to help if he could. Dreamland was his home and he had to protect it as well as his new friend.

He'd actually been watching when Samus had taken down the monster in the woods and was amazed by her abilities. When she and Dedede had headed further into the woods after the thing had died the young warrior walked into the clearing and looked at the body briefly, poking the corpse for a second before rushing after the two adults. As he followed them he'd noticed Meta Knight up in the trees.

The older star warrior was also looking in the direction the two had gone and hadn't even noticed Kirby. The fact he was there but hadn't made his pretense known to them made Kirby wonder why, but how could he ask him about it? Before he could even try to get Meta Knights attention the warrior disappeared in a fluffy of dark colored wings.

Kirby jumped back, startled and blinked. Had Meta Knight flown away? Did he have wings? Since when and why didn't he ever use them in front of people? Weird.

Oh well, it wasn't important right now. The young warrior had other more important, things to think about right now and Meta Knight having the ability to fly wasn't one of them. He had to catch up with Samus.

So, completely forgetting about the older warrior, Kirby turned back in the direction the adults had gone, and rushed after them.

* * *

Kirby had not been seeing things. Meta Knight had indeed been in the trees and flew off using a pair of blue and purple bat wings. Nobody knew about this part of him, not even Sword and Blade. It wasn't because he was hiding it from them, he just didn't feel the need to make a big deal about it.

Right now he was using those wings to follow after Samus and King Dedede as they made their way to Kabu Canyon. The determined way the female bounty hunter was walking made it apparent that she believed she would find what she was looking for somewhere inside the canyon.

Was that where the queen was? he wondered, flying closer but still not making his pretense known to the two on the ground. If it was maybe he could find it first and figure out a way to deal with it.

Unlike Samus Aran, Meta Knight did not have any equipment specially made to take down metroids, as they were mostly weak to freezing, especially the more vulnerable early forms. That didn't mean conventional weapons couldn't do anything. If memory served him the later more durable forms could be damaged by conventional weapons, including projectiles. His sword beam ability might even cause the queen major discomfort.

Suddenly, as he was thinking about this, something entered his mind, an old memory and he was instantly overcome by an awful feeling of dread. For some reason the idea of confronting the queen became a very bad idea and he wasn't sure he wanted to even try to locate it anymore.

 _Don't be foolish,_ he scolded himself. _You have to find it, you have to find it and kill it before it gives birth to more of them._

Pushing away the terrible feeling he pressed on ahead, flying over the canyon but seeing nothing. If he wanted to find anything down there he would have to get closer and he was not looking forward to doing that, because even though he wasn't willing to admit it, he was dreading what he would find.

 _Maybe it isn't down there after all-_ but before he could finish the thought, he caught sight of two transparent green bodies floating quickly out of the ravine. It didn't take him too long to realize what they were.

Metroids and by the looks of it they had recently been hatched too. He considered that for a moment then swooped in, swinging his sword at one of the newborns. The blade slipped over the transparent skin, actually managing to slice it open. The newborn metroid let out a distressed squeal before floating downward back into the canyon depths. A moment later a loud roar ripped through the air.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

"But you don't know if it's there!" Dedede protested once more as he and the female bounty hunter moved closer to the canyon. He didn't want to go in the canyon, he wanted to turn and run as far away from the place as possible. "It could be anywhere else, like in the Boomadooma volcano, or even-"

"Or even where?" Samus turned to look at him, frowning. "The ocean? This is the only logical place it could be, unless of course it decided to take up residence somewhere in your castle?"

As if to prove her point two small Metroid's suddenly came floating out of the depths of the canyon. Dedede stared at the metroids, open mouthed, then at Samus who smirked. "Any more excuses?" she asked.

She grabbed his hand like a mother taking their child to their first day of preschool and marched toward the canyon with him, even as he protested. But they hadn't gone more than a step when the hunter caught sight of a large, round, winged figure swoop down at the two metroid and cut a large slice in one of them, causing it to fall with an unhappy squeal. Two seconds later the entire canyon was shook by a very loud, very angry, roar that would have sent Dedede fleeing back to his castle if Samus didn't have a firm grip on the collar of his robes.

Even as he tried to flee Samus just held on, not even phased by his struggling. She was too busy staring at the figure who had attacked the baby metroid, with a thoughtful look on her face. Though it was a pretty good distance away, something about it seemed familiar. She tapped the side of her helmet and her visor changed color as she changed the settings to zoom in on the figure. After a moment she could see it clearly.

Meta Knight.

 _I found you. I finally found you._

"Come on," she said to King Dedede, beginning to walk into the canyon and dragging him with her. "Let's get this over with."

"What!?" he exclaimed. "Didn't ya hear that? Ya really want to go and confront that thing and make me do it too?!"

"You know why," she said to him. "Now man up and face your responsibilities like a proper king."

"But I don't _want_ to be a proper King!" he protested, digging his nails into the ground, creating long furrows as she continued to drag him along. "I wanna be a sloppy king who over eats and plays video games all day!"

Samus continued to ignore him. She pulled him into the canyon with her, looking around herself as she went further in. She wasn't just looking for the metroid queen while she was down there but any other signs of Meta Knight as well. She knew he hadn't flown off after he'd harmed that baby metroid so he was somewhere down there, probably after the same thing she was. She just hoped he didn't try anything foolish once he found it. While the queen wasn't freezable like some of the early stages of a metroid's life cycle, it would still take more than just a sword to take her out.

But at the moment he wasn't the biggest problem she had. King Dedede was still protesting loudly and, for the moment, it hadn't attracted any unwanted attention but who knew how long that would last? If he didn't shut his mouth he'd draw in all the metroids in the canyon and then he _would_ have something to cry about.

"Will you be quiet?" she hissed, giving his robe another tug. "If you keep up that racket you're going to attract unwanted attention. Do want more metroids to attack us?"

The question had the desired affect and he fell silent, though his expression said he really wanted to just get out of there. She couldn't really fault him for that, this wasn't how she wanted to spend her evening either but thanks to the king's actions she didn't have a choice. They would just have to deal with it.

Samus didn't see Meta Knight anywhere so it was time to solely focus on finding the queen. If she allowed herself to be distracted by thinking about him she risked leaving herself open for attack. She switched the function on her visor again and looked around again, this time picking up on a faint heat signature deeper in the canyon.

* * *

Meta Knight was regretting attacking the baby metroid. While it had actually confirmed where the Queen was located it had also most likely clued in the metroids that predators were nearby which would put them on the defense. Much as metroids seemed to only be mindless energy draining animals the higher forms of them actually did seem to have some kind of intelligence, especially queens.

Most definitely queens...

He found a place in the canyon and landed, folding his wings under his cape, and looking around himself. He saw no metroids, but that didn't mean there weren't any around. One could be close by but out of sight, waiting for a chance to pop out of the shadows and drain him dry.

He couldn't just stay where he was , he was going to have to get moving and find that queen, much as he was not looking forward to it.

Okay, time to get going.

Pushing his fears aside he stepped out from behind the rocks he'd landed by and started moving further into the canyon. Nothing came out to attack him and he felt a little better and confident enough to keep going, but just to be sure he unsheathed Galaxia and gripped the hilt firmly as he proceeded.

"I knew I would find you down here."

Meta Knight paused at the sound of the voice. Slowly he turned to face the speaker, knowing who the voice belonged to even without seeing her face. He didn't want to see her but she spotted him and he couldn't avoid her any longer.

"Hello, Miss Aran."

The bounty hunter walked up to him, dragging King Dedede behind her as she did. "I was hoping our reunion would be at a better time but it looks like trouble will always follow us." she remarked, looking down at the old star warrior.

Meta Knight nodded at her. "Indeed."

"Now I would be asking why you have been avoiding me all day but we have more important things to worry about right now," she said, looking away from him and pointing further into the canyon. "Something tells me that our target is just a little further down so it's best we ready ourselves for it."

Meta Knight nodded again and was about to say something when King Dedede shouted. 'Hey Meta Knight! You work for me! I command you to make her let me go!"

"Sorry, your highness," Samus spoke up, lifting him off the ground and throwing him over her shoulder. "But you have no say in the matter when it comes to this. I don't care if Meta Knight is working for you, until this is over you have no command of anyone, especially a star warrior." She looked down at Meta Knight again. "Shall we proceed?"

"Very well."

They started walking, King Dedede still wriggling in her grip and protesting all the way.

"By the way, why do you have the king with you?" Meta Knight asked after a moment. "He does not seem to be the proper thing to bring along during this kind of mission."

Samus placed her hand on the king she was carrying to get a better hold of him. "Your king here is the reason the metroids are here," she explained. "So I am taking him with me to face his responsibility."

"But he will be of no use once we have located the queen," the star warrior explained to her. "There will be nothing he can do against it.

The bounty hunter considered this for a moment. Meta Knight was around Dedede every day so he would know more about dreamland's monarch than she would which meant he was probably right. "If things get out of hand I will allow him to flee," she assured the knight. "I don't want to be responsible for your king's demise." She paused then slowly set Dedede down on the ground, he stared at her in disbelief.

"I think you probably have learned your lesson now," she spoke to him. "so I will allow you to get out of here before things start getting intense. Now, if you don't want to die, I think you should be heading back to your castle."

King Dedede needed no second bidding. He was up on his feet and dashing back the way they had come in less than a second. She watched him flee, surprised at how fast he was for someone so fat then looked back at Meta Knight. "Satisfied?"

The star warrior didn't respond to that. He turned away from her and walked silently forward. She followed, not wanting to continue the conversation anyway.

As they walked Samus was tempted to start up a conversation with Meta Knight and make him explain why he had been avoiding her but decided now was not the time to discuss it since there were more pressing issues to deal with, and said nothing. Instead she looked around herself, left hand resting at the ready on her arm canon. While she knew the queen would stay in one area to guard her eggs she would likely send her offspring out to deal with them. While she couldn't freeze the metroids more advanced forms she didn't have as much of a hard time dealing with them at earlier stages. The zetas and omegas were her biggest issue but maybe things would be easier with Meta Knight there to help her.

At least she hoped so.

"The queen shouldn't be much further," she explained to Meta Knight in a hushed voice. "I'm not expecting her to just sit there and wait for us to come to her without retaliation. Last time I had to take out a queen I had to deal with an Omega metroid and a few Zetas. They are stronger and more fierce than the normal ones and can't be frozen, however they do have other weaknesses. Your sword beam should be strong enough to, if not kill one, at least injure it quite severely."

"How do you know Galaxia can even harm them?" the star warrior wanted to know. "I was led to believe they are only weak to ice."

"They have other weaknesses, Meta Knight," Samus assured him. "Especially the later forms. I have used super missiles and power bombs against them in the past when ice didn't do anything and it worked just fine." she glanced at him, frowning slightly. "Are you all right?"

"I am fine," he answered her. "Why would you get the impression that I am not?"

"Nothing," she said, looking away. Maybe she'd been imagining the slight tremble in his body. "It's not important, I was just making sure you were ready for what's about to come."

"I am ready."

She would soon see if that statement was true. Something was telling her something was wrong with the knight but she couldn't figure out why. He was inexperienced so that was probably why. Unlike her he didn't deal with metroids on a daily basis like she did so maybe he was nervous even though he didn't want to admit it and that was why she'd caught that slight trembling in his frame. She couldn't blame him. It wasn't like she enjoyed fighting metroids either, especially ones that had been experimented on by the space pirates.

A few minutes later the duo heard an ear splitting scream and looked up. Metroids in their zeta forms clung to the cliffs above like gargoyles, their many eyes all focused on the two warriors below. Samus raised her arm, aiming her blaster at the metroids as about a dozen of them lunged. She fired a charged blast of energy, knocking some of the monsters back. Meta Knight rushed at two more, swinging Galaxia in a wide arch, sending the beasts scattering.

The female bounty hunter jumped over him, firing a charged blast of ice at another metroid Zeta that jumped down from the cliffs. The blast knocked it back, sending it crashing into more Zetas that joined it.

"Find the Queen!" Meta Knight called out to her as he dispatched two more. "I will deal with the rest."

Samus looked back at him then nodded, rushing deep into the canyon.

Meta Knight would be okay by himself, he was a highly capable warrior. Plus zeta metroids were easier to keep track of during battle over the smaller ones. Even if he didn't use ice on the beasts Galaxia would be more than capable to take them out.

She saw the broken egg shells before she saw the queen. The shells were still dripping liquid which meant larvae had hatched from them recently. Probably the babies Meta Knight had attacked earlier. Lifting her head she spotted more eggs laying around, some broken and some unhatched. She raised her arm cannon and aimed it at one of the unhatched eggs. Now to ensure there would be no more metroids on Popstar.

Before she could fire a loud screech made her look up. A large, clawed hand was coming toward her. Jumping quickly out of the way she turned into her morph ball and rolled away, dropping power bombs which exploded and put some distance between her and her attacker. The attacking creature roared in protest. Samus uncurled out of the morph ball and faced her opponent.

Standing before her was a large, bulking, many eyed beast covered in sharp spines and heavy, impenetrable armor. It's back and front legs dug into the rocky ground with sharp and deadly claws. The beast stared her down and before roaring angrily right into her face. Samus took it, unflinching and when the beast pulled back its head to glare down at her once more and she went into an offensive stance, planting her feet firmly on the ground and aiming her arm cannon defiantly in its face.

* * *

Meta Knight might have made a mistake telling Samus to go off and deal with the queen while he took care of the Zetas. The beasts wound up being harder to take down than he thought. The creatures might not be weak to ice like their younger forms but other types of attacks didn't make them suddenly weak to everything else. He did manage to harm the beasts but it took some effort and so far he'd only taken out two of them.

If he didn't do something soon he wasn't going to make it out alive. He was going to have to release his full power to take these things out. It had been so long since he'd done so however so he wasn't sure how effective it would be.

A Zeta pounced at him, breaking him out of his thoughts. He slashed at it, making a large slice across it's body. It fell backward screeching only to be replaced by two others.

Suddenly he found himself surrounded. He looked around himself at the metroids penning him in an all sides. Realizing he no longer had any other alternative he tossed away his cape, revealing his wings and, focusing his energy, he released a devastating tornado that sent the zeta's into the air. He flew into the tornado and unleashed all of his power, reducing the zetas to pieces in a matter of seconds.

After defeating the beasts he sheathed Galaxia and rushed off to join Samus against the queen.

The star warrior came upon them just as he saw Samus land a short distance away and crouch down. She was facing a giant hulking beast who loomed over her. The hunter glanced his way, not turning as she faced the beast. She straightened and raised her arm cannon only to have to jump out of the way when it swiped at her with it's claws.

Meta Knight also saw the blow coming in his direction as well and jumped up, unfurling his wings to get even further out of its range.

Samus landed on a large boulder, ducking behind it when the queen breathed fire in her direction. She pressed her back flat against it and lifted her arm canon to change the settings on it before jumping out and firing a charged blast into it's face.

The impact caused the metroid queen to let out a ear splitting screech, making the entire canyon shake.

Suddenly Meta Knight froze. The impact of the roar seemed to penetrate him to the soul, smacking him hard and destroying a mental block in his mind that he'd spend years putting up. A long buried memory sprang to the surface, filling his mind with gruesome images. Present day vanished from his vision as he was thrust back in time to a past event where he'd also gone up against a metroid queen.

 _Roaring, screaming, the sight of many star warriors being massacred by a queen, one as big as the one he was currently facing, and her offspring. Voices screaming for his help, begging for_ _ **any**_ _kind of help._

"Meta Knight!" Samus voice brought him back to the present. He looked down at the female bounty hunter who was standing near some metroid eggs, while firing her charge beam at the metroid queen. The sight of the eggs brought back another flashback of beasts breaking out of eggs and instantly attaching themselves to their victims, reducing them to empty husks. Then he was thrown back into the present once more in time to spot one of the eggs cracking open.

He was hit with another flashback before returning again, this one of an Omega metroid grabbing a a star warrior right beside him, and then his vision clear. He heard Samus shout his name again, but the queen roared a second time, scrambling his thoughts and sending him into a blind panic. Before he could even get a chance collect himself and think rationally, he'd turned away from the bounty hunter and the queen, flying rapidly off in the opposite direction.

00

Samus caught a glimpse of the metroid hatching out of the egg and jerked sideways, hitting the larva with an ice missile. It let out a screech as it froze then crashed to the ground, shattering. It's mother roared in anger at the death of its child and swung at her with its claws. She ducked the blow, curling into the morph ball and rolling away.

Once she was out of range, she changed back and turned her head, looking around for the star warrior as she called out his name again. "Meta Knight!"

But he was gone.

Swearing at this unexpected turn of events she spun to face the queen who was baring down on her. Once again she curled up into the morph ball and rolled away from it, leaving power bombs in her wake to serve as a deterrent. She rolled up a slope and launched into the air, uncurling and twisting backwards to fire after the queen and the larva that had hatched out of more eggs.

The ice beam took down some of the babies, though it did nothing more to the queen than anger her.

Samus landed on a ledge a good distance from the raging queen and the many larva who had hatched from the eggs scattered around. She raised her arm to fire a charged shot at them.

"Kirby!"

Samus turned at the sound of the voice and spotted two figures near the canyon entrance that led into the queen's nest. She recognized them right away as the girl named Tiff and the baby star warrior Kirby.

What were they doing there?!

The bounty hunter jumped off the ledge and rushed toward the children. She didn't know how the children got there but she had to get them away from the nest before they became metroid dinner.

She heard the queen roaring behind her which were joined by screeches and more roars. She glanced back, spotting more metroids in differing stages of development coming after her. She swore and looked ahead, reaching out and grabbing up both Tiff and Kirby off the ground before making her exit from the canyon.

Time to retreat for now, if she'd continued fighting she would be overwhelmed and killed. For now she would get out of there and get the children to a safe place before deciding her next plan of action.

While she was at it she was going to find Meta Knight and make him explain his actions down in the canyon. It was about time she got to the bottom of his weird behavior and this time she would get the whole story, _even if she had to tie him down and_ _ **force**_ _it out of him_.


End file.
